


I Will Learn Before I Die

by hou_dini



Category: Football RPF
Genre: M/M, highschool!au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-12
Updated: 2016-11-12
Packaged: 2018-08-30 12:34:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 43,158
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8533279
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hou_dini/pseuds/hou_dini
Summary: Highschool!AU! The year Daniel Agger arrives at Anfield High and turns the lives of the football team upside down.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [torres](https://archiveofourown.org/users/torres/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Collision Course](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1581419) by [torres](https://archiveofourown.org/users/torres/pseuds/torres). 



> Your mandatory high school!AU story, except this is the AU of an AU. This story was written as a prequel to [torres](http://archiveofourown.org/users/torres/pseuds/torres)’ incredible epic [Collision Course](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1581419/chapters/3358988). If you want to know more about why I wrote this (it's an interesting story, I promise), just read the notes at the end of the story. You do not have to have read CC in order to understand this, since this is a prequel and all of the events in CC are irrelevant here. However, if you are familiar with CC, you’ll notice there are several references. What you should have in mind about Collision Course (if you’re not familiar) is this:  
> \- The story starts with Daniel complaining about Finns’ decision to end their buddy fuck arrangement for reasons that you will find out if you read this prequel (it’s never explained in full details in CC).  
> \- Fernando Torres has just arrived at Anfield High and Daniel is immediately head over heels for him, which prompts Finns to become very jealous and do a lot of crazy shit.  
> \- Stevie and Xabi are King and King of school and have been together for a while, however Xabi is still hung up on his ex, Harry Kewell.  
> \- Harry is Fernando’s roommate and, in spite of being a free spirit who charms his way through life and beds more people than he can remember, he’s still very much into Xabi, the one he never got over.  
> \- Harry and Finns eventually end up together. 
> 
> If you do read this, please let me know your thoughts! :) Bear in mind that English is not my first language and this story was not beta'ed, so please forgive me for all the mistakes and be kind!

Daniel Agger was danger.

That was the first thing Stephen Finnan learned about him. The kind of bad company parents warned their children about. So stereotyped it was actually kind of ridiculous at times. A walking bad-boy cliché, he had the whole package: dirty mouth, arrogance, cigarettes, tattoos and a generous dose of alcohol always stashed somewhere for good measure.

They didn't have a particularly good year in terms of new talent joining the football squad. None of the newcomers had seemed especially skillful, at least not enough to take them to the next level and put them in place to win silverware for Anfield High. Some of the senior students were starting to lack the level of concentration the national championship demanded. Harry Kewell had quit it altogether after a nasty injury to join the school paper. With yet another season of frustrations lying ahead, disappointment had already fallen upon the team when Rafa called an extraordinary meeting to introduce _the new guy_.

His family had just been transferred to Liverpool from Denmark, said Rafa. Came with a letter of recommendation from his former school, where he’d been team captain, full of praises and encouraging words. Stephen saw when Stevie, seating at the front row, rolled his eyes. No one could exactly blame him for being skeptic; many had come with shiny résumés in the last couple of seasons, most had turned out to be huge fiascos. They took their football seriously at Anfield High.

What Stephen found distinctly curious about the Danish kid was that he didn’t seem intimidated at all by the fact he was being judged by every single person in that room. He just stood there, next to Rafa, looking almost… bored. Like he couldn’t wait for the gaffer to shut up and let him onto the pitch. Most of the newcomers looked nervous, shaky, sweaty and positively terrified. The Steven Gerrard Scrutiny was known by all to be tougher than any Ferguson or Wenger test. But this guy… There was just something about him.

The second thing Finnan learned about Daniel was that he had every reason to look as presumptuous as he did. He wasn’t just _good_. Carra was good. He was something slightly above that, if a little bit less experienced. And to be actually better than Carragher, who was somewhat like a legend to the rest of the team – and, more importantly, hear so from the man himself – was to get a stamp that’d assure him on the starting XI despite Stevie’s incisive protests. And there were some. Agger’s bad temper didn’t help at all to get him a place on their side, but his perfectly timed tackles and classy football skills (who would’ve thought Daniel could have class?) presented a pretty good case for him.

He actually managed to stop Gerrard, the bright jewel of Merseyside, more than once, much to the captain’s dislike. That wouldn’t normally be a bad thing, if only Agger hadn’t been so aggressively intense in his exhibition. He seemed keener on showing he could overcome Gerrard than on proving he was worthy of a spot on the team per se – which was an assumption he’d apparently already made before the trial even started. As Sami very precisely put, it was like watching two lions battling for the place of alpha male.

Stevie tried to argue, but Agger was just too good to be ignored, even against the captain’s wishes. Eventually he had to give in. Daniel Agger was going to help them bring home the trophy in one or two seasons, even if it meant a few punches would be exchanged along the way.

The Dane didn’t seem particularly inclined to make friends, which was by no means a problem as long he didn’t bail on them.

For what mattered, Stevie was fine with that arrangement; he didn’t like the kid anyway. But Finns was curious. He watched Daniel out of the corner of his eyes in the dressing room, the tattoos covering his arms and back. Die-hard Danish pride, he could tell. The cemetery was a little too dark for his Irish taste, but he kind of liked it, in a weird sort of way. It seemed to suit the kid’s farfetched personality.

Daniel Agger’s rough-edged attitude stroke almost everyone else as intolerable, but there was something to it that made Finns wonder. It didn’t completely push him away. Agger was a loner, one who seemed convinced he wouldn’t be finding any kind of company in that dressing room, and so didn’t even bother trying. He got in with a curt ‘Hey’, parted with less than that. His lack of apparent communication skills off the pitch made up for his excessive use of foul language while on it. Daniel just wouldn’t shut the fuck up, which often meant he’d get on heated arguments with Stevie about all sorts of petty things.

Stephen thought it was practically a miracle that, months after Daniel’s arrival, they still hadn’t heard of fists flying between the duo. And so they were a team.

x-x-x

It was on a particularly rainy Wednesday afternoon that Finns got properly introduced to Daniel Agger, little less than three months after the Dane arrived.

Rafa decided to split the first team into two sides and play one against the other, and he obviously didn’t commit the juvenile mistake of placing Stevie and Agger on opposing sides. Stevie captained the red team, while Carra took on the armband for the yellow one. It would’ve been hard enough for anyone to beat the team that ended up with Stevie on it, but having Agger to hold the backside made it even tougher. Luis Garcia and Dirk Kuyt, as fine as they were on the ball, weren’t match for Daniel Agger, Sami Hyypia and Pepe Reina.

Finnan just sighed as he watched his teammates losing yet another ball to Xabi, who advanced through the midfield, head held high, eyes electric and already calculating where on the pitch Stevie would be by the time he passed him the ball. The genius little fucker.

“Great pick, Carra,” he mouthed to his captain as he ran past him to hold back Stevie, running down on his direction. With one flowy movement, the captain got rid of Finnan and received the ball from Xabi – one touch with his left foot to get past Carra, a little twist of his body to adjust, a second with his right to sack it. Finnan sighed wearily again, looked up at the dark clouds above his head and watched as the generous raindrops fell down on him. Quite fitting for his defeated mood.

“You getting daft, Finnan?!” Carra barked at him. “Open your fookin’ eye there, la!”

Finns just shook his head. His spare captain would be in one of his famous moods today, while the original one was all smiles and praise from his teammates, which included even a polite nod of head from Agger.

Just when they were heading towards the last minutes of the torture session, the cold rain already creeping into his body and starting to freeze his bones, Finnan spotted a chance of lessening the yellow side’s pain by maybe getting another goal in. He ran down the right wing, ball always in control, left Stevie behind (which put a smile immediately upon his face, despite the fact the captain wasn’t even all that eager to stop him) and raised his head to find Dirk waiting on that sweet, sweet spot, just at the head of the box.

It was a matter of fraction of a second between the moment he made eye contact with Kuyt and looked down again at the ball. Somehow though, before he could connect his foot to it, a truck came out of nowhere and hit him right on his calf, unceremoniously sending him down on the wet lawn.

“Jesus fuck, Agger! What the hell are you thinking?!” he half heard Carra screaming. Finnan had his eyes scrunched closed and his hands on his knee, that throbbing pain going up his leg from the point where Agger’s boots connected with his skin all the way up to his thighs. Stephen bit his lip to keep from screaming and buried his face down on the grass.

“Are you insane?!” Definitely Stevie now. “Hey, Finns. You ok, mate?” He felt a cold hand touching his sides, forcing him to roll back and lie with his face up, which he complied to do after a little insistence. “Hey, hey. Let me see.”

He took a deep breath, containing a painful groan while Stevie pulled down his bloodied sock and silently thanked God for the weather. No one could tell the wet patches on his face were from his tears.

x-x-x

The injury looked even uglier once it was clean and dry. He sat down at the bench in the changing room, towel tied around his waist, put his feet up and tentatively touched the ugly red and bloody gash marks on his calf.

His face crumpled up in a grimace when he felt the sharp pain from the touch. It would probably look even worse in a few days. The school doctor said he’d live, but should probably stay away from training for a week or so. _'You're lucky you didn't break anything'.Lucky_ , Finns thought, was definitely not the right word.

“Hey,” he heard the heavy accented Spanish voice of Xabier Alonso, making him abort another attempt to touch his wound. The Spaniard looked sincerely sorry for him. “Are you gonna be ok?”

“I guess,” he answered with a shrug. “I’ll survive.”

“Do you need help?”

“No, ‘s alright.”

“Stevie and I can help you get to the bus. It’s still pouring down outside,” he kindly offered, throwing his backpack over one shoulder.

Finnan smiled wanly at his colleague. “Thank you, but I think I can handle. It looks worse than it feels.” A blatant lie, that was.

“Ok,” Xabi accepted. “Call us if you need anything.”

With one of his best posterboy smiles, the Spaniard left the room all to Stephen’s pain. He breathed out, combed a hand through his still wet hair and got up. Everyone else was already gone.

Stephen frowned as he loosened the towel around his waist. The entire team seemed pretty pissed at the Agger boy, they made sure to state. He'd probably get some cold glares from the lads - or colder, in Stevie's case - for the rest of the week. And now that he thought about it, he hadn’t seen Agger since –

The door to the changing room sprung open at the exact moment he let go of his towel, and in walked Daniel Agger. Finnan looked up at his teammate, all wet and dirty, still wearing his uniform. There was a moment’s pause before he snapped and bent down to get back the towel to cover himself.

“Agger,” he said, a little exasperated. “I thought I was alone here.”

The Dane raised an eyebrow at him, studiously. “Yeah,” he said, slowly. “No.”

“Clearly,” the Irishman replied through clenched teeth. This was the changing room of a football team. They showered together, they got dressed and undressed in front of each other all the time. Finns wasn't supposed to be feeling so self-conscious of his own nudity. But there was just something about the way Daniel looked at him - and, well, it was just the two of them there. Besides, Agger had nearly ended his footballing career a couple of hours earlier; it seemed rather unbecoming to be naked in front of his aggressor.

There was an awkward stretch of silence, during which Finnan didn’t know whether to feel more ashamed at the way Agger had eyed him up and down, or simply angry at the other boy for the tackle.

Agger was the first to speak, nodding towards his leg. “How bad is it?” he asked, completely nonchalant about the fact he had been, what… Checking Finns out? No, that was just… No.

Finns shook his head a little bit to push out the embarrassing thoughts and gazed away, raising the towel to reveal the damage he’d caused. If he felt anything, Agger didn’t show. He looked at the swollen redness, soon to turn purple, as someone who stares at a painting hanging on a museum wall.

"The doctor said I was lucky I didn't have that foot on the ground at the moment of the tackle or I would be showing you a bone sticking out of my leg rather than cuts and bruises," Finns added, giving himself poetic license to blow off the proportions of the doctor's words in order to try and squeeze some kind of reaction out of the other boy.

Nothing.

“Sorry about that,” Daniel eventually said, conveying no honesty at all. “Didn’t mean to… You know.”

“Right.”

“Rafa was giving me a lecture outside. I’ll be out of the team if I do that again, so you don’t have to worry about it.”

Finnan huffed a laugh under his breath. “Well, thank you for that. Very considerate of you.”

“Here,” Agger said, and moved towards a little box where they kept first aid kits. He grabbed a spray and a bottle of water and got on his knees next to Finnan. “Sit down.”

Somewhat suspicious, he agreed. Agger threw cold water over his injury, which made Finnan hold his breath for just a second, and then sprayed him with the can. It ached like hell, then felt incredibly cold, like someone had just put his leg inside a giant ice cube. But two seconds later and the pain had considerably lessened.

“Better?” Agger asked.

Finns blinked once, twice, then looked down at the other boy, who was staring at him with expectancy. “Yeah, actually,” he said, awkwardly. “Thanks. I guess.”

“You’re welcome,” the Dane said as he got up.

“You almost ripped my leg off and now I’m thanking you. That doesn’t feel right.”

“I already apologized,” he said as he bent over and started taking off his wet boots and socks. “I don’t reckon it will you make you feel better if I do it again, but I can, if you insist.”

Finnan snorted, gazing at Daniel’s cemetery as he took off his shirt. “Whatever,” he said, and got up to get dressed.

He put on his pants and jeans, got down to put on socks, very carefully, and then his sneakers. By the time he’d finished dressing, Daniel already had a towel around his own waist and was moving towards the showers. They locked eyes for a moment before the Dane disappeared across the room.

“Arsehole,” he muttered, putting his jacket on, taking his backpack and closing his locker.

Just as he was about to leave, he heard Agger’s mild accent once more. “Hey,” he said. Stephen turned to see Daniel standing next to the shower door, little green flocks of grass all over his chest.

“It’s Stephen, right?”

“Two months and you still don’t know my name?”

“They call you Finns, how am I supposed to know?”

“We’re on the same bloody team, it’s how you’re supposed to know.”

“Yeah, well,” he shrugged it off. “Stephen. Listen, I just wanna say that I really am, you know… Sorry. I’ve been saving one of those for Gerrard, but I didn’t mean to go in with so much strength on you. The pitch was wet, I miscalculated.”

“Well, I suppose it makes everything better to know I took one for the captain,” Finns replied, all cynicism.

Agger rolled his eyes. “That’s not what I meant.”

“Yeah, I know.” He sighed. “Just – be more careful next time. You could get someone important out of a match.”

“I’ll have to,” Agger said, matter-of-factly.

“Stevie would have your head on a wall,” Finns added for no reason at all other than to get his finger on the raw. Daniel seemed to swallow down a reply that, Stephen guessed, wouldn’t have been exactly polite or appropriate considering he was the one doing the apologies there. Instead, he merely turned around to leave Finnan alone again.

The Irish boy stared into the empty spot where his teammate had been just a moment before, shook his head and spun around on his heels. “Un-fucking-believable,” he muttered, and limped his way to the bus stop.

x-x-x

“Hey, Finns!” Sami greeted him when he showed up five days later to watch the lads training. He sat down on the bench by the pitch and went by completely unnoticed until Rafa called the day off. Sami was the first to see him. Finns smiled at him; Sami had always been one of his favorites. “How are you doing there, lad?”

He shrugged. “Ok, I guess. It doesn’t hurt so much anymore. It looks terrible though.”

“Oi!” they turned to see Pepe and Arbeloa coming towards them. “If it isn’t our favorite Irish boy!”

"I'm your only Irish boy, Pepe."

"Not the point, Finns." Reina gave him a gentle pet on the head. "Thought you’d forgotten about us already.”

“Didn’t call, didn’t reply to our texts, couldn’t be found outside the classrooms, didn’t show up at the diner last Friday…” Arbeloa added, counting his crimes on his fingers as he went on.

Finnan didn’t actually have an excuse for that. He’d taken his time out to study and prepare for the exams but, if he had to be honest, that wasn’t really why he’d ignored all of them. Well, not all of them. One of them had enough news on him to keep the team up to post with his recovery.

“Hey, Finns!” Carra approached the group, dirty shirt hanging on his shoulder as he rubbed his hands on the side of his shorts and extended it for him to shake it. Stephen offered him a sincere smile and accepted the handshake as though thanking the other boy for keeping him from having to answer to Arbeloa’s unconsciously loaded comment. “Finally decided to grace us with your presence, did you? Thought Stevie would be the middle man between us and your royal self forever.”

So much for the help there.

“He’s the captain, Carra, he gets special treatment,” Pepe explained.

Stevie had been the only one whose texts and phone calls hadn’t gone by unanswered. Well ok, one phone call and a couple of texts, anyway. As hard as he tried, he couldn’t ignore Steven Gerrard. And his utter inability to resist the urge to have any sort of contact with their captain made Finns feel pathetic, desperate and stupid, in turns. Sometimes all at once. Most times, actually. Which was precisely why he'd kept his distance now that he was likely to get pity attention from his colleagues.

“How long ‘till you come back?” Sami asked.

Finns turned to him again, welcoming the chance to avoid the awkward subjects. “Not sure yet. Maybe a few more days. I guess it wouldn’t be prudent to risk getting another kick on my calf before it’s completely healed.”

“Take your time, Finns,” Arbeloa said, sitting down next to him and putting an arm around his shoulders. “Your position is safe with me,” he grinned.

“Is that a threat, Alvaro?”

“Not at all!” the Spaniard objected. “I’m just guaranteeing you have a safe recovery.”

“He’s been babbling about stealing your place the whole week, Finns,” Carra said. “Don’t fall for that crap.”

“Well, I’m happy to see I don’t need to worry at all about being backstabbed while I’m _injured_ ,” he made sure to emphasize the last word for dramatic measure, looking straight at Alvaro.

Arbeloa held a hand to his chest and pretended to be hurt in a very Spanish, very over the top way. “I’m hurt, Stephen, _hurt_ , that you’d think something like that of me. I mean nothing but well to you. _Hurt_!”

With that, he got up and marched to the changing room, being closely followed by Pepe and Carra, who patted him on the shoulder before leaving.

“We’re all heading for the diner later,” Sami said before joining the others. “Are you coming?”

Finns studied his mate’s hopeful face and gave up on finding an excuse before even trying. “Sure, why not?”

Satisfied, Sami bid farewell with a smile and left Finns by himself once more. Stephen’s eyes quickly roamed over the pitch in search of… something. The same thing he always looked for before everything else.

Stevie was standing next to Rafa, Riise and Xabi, the four of them discussing some tactic or another above the gaffer’s drawing board.

“See anything you like?”

Finnan jumped on his seat, startled, and turned a little to find Daniel Agger standing next to him, little smug smile dancing on the corner of his lips.

“Agger,” he said. “Didn’t see you there.”

“I know. You were very drawn to the little gathering over there to notice me.” Uninvited, the Dane sat down beside him. “So, who is it? Xabi?”

Finnan’s brow creased very deeply. “What?”

“I have a particular soft spot for Spaniards myself.”

“The fuck are you on about?”

Daniel turned his face to him, looked him right in the eye, and grinned. A cheeky, condescending smile that didn’t at all try to hide what was going through his head. “Nothing,” he simply said, before nodding towards his leg. “How’s that going?”

“Awful. I hear I might’ve lost my starting place to Arbeloa.”

Daniel puffed. “Yeah, right. Like that will ever happen.”

Finns cocked him an eyebrow. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“Arbeloa can’t cross a ball if his life hangs on it. I’m pretty sure your spot is safe. Don’t try to make me feel guilty.”

“Oh, I am so sorry,” Finns replied in mock-apology. “Please, do forgive me if I make you feel guilty for nearly cutting my leg off and leaving me out of practice for a week.”

“I already apologized. What else do you want?”

“Some solidarity wouldn’t be all that bad.”

“It wouldn’t, would it?” Agger took a deep breath and then pushed himself up the bench. “Well, good to see you’re still standing, Stephen.”

Finnan couldn’t help but frown a little at the way his name sounded on that boy’s voice. No one else on the team called him Stephen, unless they were trying to mock him. It sounded strangely good to hear the rough edges on Daniel’s Danish accent pronouncing it.

“Ahm,” he started. “Are you joining the others at the diner tonight?”

Daniel stared at him deadpanned for a second too long. “I don’t think so.”

“Why not?”

“I wasn’t invited, it seems.”

Finnan mouthed a silent Oh. And actually felt a little bad for the lad. Insufferable as he could be at times – not to mention _dangerous_ \- it could not be easy to be the new kid in town, not a single friend to keep you company, uninvited to your own team’s get-togethers. Finns would probably feel a little hostile as well if it was him.

“And anyway, I’ve got stuff to do,” Daniel added. “Well. I’ll see you around.”

“Wait!” Finnan raised a hand to stop him, then searched his backpack for his mobile. “What’s your number?”

“What?”

“Your phone number.”

Seemingly suspicious, Agger gave him his number. Finnan dialed it on his own mobile and waited to hear it ring once, then smiled. “There. Now you have mine,” he said, putting it back inside his bag. “Just in case you change your mind about the diner.”

Under the slightly confused watch of the Dane, he stood up, threw his bag over his shoulder and limped off. “See you, Daniel,” he said, waving a little goodbye.

x-x-x

Daniel Agger wasn’t fond of complicated things.

By definition, he didn’t like people. People were, first and foremost, complicated. Too hard to figure out. People had expectations and dreams and preferences and weird ways of dealing with their shit. Agger didn’t have time or patience for that. He missed his country, his old school and his friends, things he was used to, things and people he could understand and relate to. He wasn’t good at making new friends, at keeping conversations interesting. He had a particular disdain for having to please people in order to make them even feel like getting to know him at all.

He never wanted to move there, but his mother wouldn’t have him staying back and, if he had to be honest, Liverpool had a pretty decent history on the football field of expertize. Enough to make it attractive in spite of everything else.

Football was simple.

Football was just about him and the ball. It was about how the grass felt under his feet, how good it felt when the crowd was screaming, cheering him on, that wonderfully heroic sensation of making a perfectly timed tackle, sliding on the lawn, taking the ball away from his opponent and putting it back where it belonged. It was almost erotic. Almost as good as sex. Sometimes it was better.

Daniel loved football, and that was the sole reason why he hadn’t threatened his parents with running away from home when they told him his father had taken a job in Liverpool. He wanted to be where good football was, even if it meant he’d have to go to the park by himself every night if he wanted to kick a ball around.

If he were to be 100% sincere with himself, he’d have to admit he did care about the fact he’d been living there for a few months now and still hadn’t managed to find one single soul to interact with. He was a loner by nature, but that didn’t mean he enjoyed loneliness all the time. No one did. Sometimes you just have to have another bloody human being there, if nothing else then at least to make sure you are still one yourself.

But he couldn’t be arsed to start following the manual for good social behavior. Not when his teammates hadn’t actually showed any sort of interest in doing the same for him. He wasn’t a beggar. He didn’t need that shit.

People were way too fucking complicated anyway.

“It can be a bitch to play by yourself, can’t it?” he heard a voice coming from behind him. Daniel whirled around to find Stephen Finnan standing just a few feet away, short grin dancing on his lips, arms crossed over his chest, watching him with a mix of curiosity and amusement on his face.

“Stephen,” he said, trying to sound more matter-of-fact than surprised, but quite probably failing.

“Is that the stuff you had to do?”

“Sure,” he replied flatly.

“Would you like a partner there?”

“Are you even allowed to do that?”

Finnan shrugged and approached him, taking off his jacket and leaving it aside. “I can play keeper.”

“And risk having you blaming me for worsening your condition? No, thank you.”

“Not made of paper, Agger. I’ll be fine.”

“Didn’t seem like that when you fell down and started to cry,” he teased, smiling as innocently as he could manage, which, admittedly, wasn’t all that convincing. Innocent definitely didn’t suit him.

Finnan’s face crumpled in a protesting grimace. “I wasn’t-!” he started, and then stopped. “Oh, fuck it.” He let out a large gust of air and moved towards the goal, stopping right above the goal line and opening his arms. “Just so you know, it really hurt, twat.”

Daniel laughed, bent down to place the ball on the right spot, eyed Finnan standing in front of him very cautiously, calculating… And then he hit it. The Irishman didn’t even need to move. Instead, he whistled. “Wonderful, Agger,” he teased. “I think that ball might’ve hit the bar at Anfield.”

“Shut up.”

Daniel jogged to get the ball back from where it fell, somewhere way beyond the goal. “What’s the point of you if you’re not gonna go get the ball?”

“I’m injured, don’t push it.”

Daniel rolled his eyes and prepared another kick. This time, Finnan jumped to stop the goal, but failed and fell on his ass while the ball died on the back of the net. “My pleasure there, Stephen.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he mumbled as he got up. “You got lucky.”

“I tend to get lucky more often than not,” he winked, not interested in keeping out the innuendo.

They continued their routine of freekicks and banter for almost an hour, until Finnan took the ball, dribbled past him and moved away.

“Sod it, I’m done,” he announced, starting a keepy uppy game by himself. Daniel stuck out his foot and kicked the ball away from him. Finnan’s face immediately contorted in pain as he fell crutching his leg.

“Jesus, Agger! What the fuck?!”

“What?! What happened?! I didn’t even touch you!” He kneeled down next to the other boy, unsure of what to do. He was certain he hadn't touched him! Right? Or... Oh, where the hell did he leave his mobile?! He should call an ambulance, he hurt the goddamn guy again! _Jesus, Daniel, indeed! How the fuck did you –_

And then he noticed something off about the way Finnan was twisting over himself on the ground.

“Are you… laughing?”

The Irishman turned around to lie on his back and couldn’t quite contain his outright laughter anymore. It resonated loud and rich through the night air to fill the entire bloody park.

“Fucker!” Daniel bellowed angrily, pushing Finnan aside and standing up. And to think he was actually worried!

“I’m sorry,” the boy managed, in-between waves of laughter. “I couldn’t resist! Your face!” and then fell back on the ground, cracking up.

“I hope you choke to death.”

The Dane walked back to where he’d left his stuff and picked up a bottle of water. Finnan took another moment before he could rein himself in and joined him, face red and black shirt all dirty. But it looked like it had been worth it, judging by the large grin showing all his perfectly white teeth.

It had been a good one, Daniel had to give him credit for it. That was exactly the kind of thing he would do himself. It was brilliant, fooling around with guilty people just to see that beautiful moment of utter desperation on their faces. Naturally, however, that thought would never be shared with the other boy.

“I’m sorry,” Stephen said again, more contained this time. “It wasn’t funny at all,” he finished, not at all looking truthful in his apology.

“Right.” Even though he was pretending to be angry, he offered Stephen his bottle. He looked like he needed it.

“Thanks.” Stephen took the bottle, drank almost everything that was left in it, and then cleaned his mouth and chin with the back of his hand. The boy's expression relaxed into one of sheer contentment, watching him silently.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“Then stop staring.”

“Sorry.”

“Stop apologizing.”

“I don’t really mean it, if it makes anything better.”

This time, he couldn’t quite keep that little grin from escaping, despite the effort to keep his dignity.

“Why didn’t you join us?”

“Join us where?”

“The diner?”

“Oh. That.” Daniel looked away from Finnan, started to put his stuff back in the bag. “Didn’t feel like it.”

“Are you always like that?”

“Like what?”

“Angry.”

He stopped, faced the Irishman again, scowling. “I’m not angry.”

“You sound angry,” Finns stated as a fact.

“Just because I don’t want to socialize with you doesn’t mean I’m angry.”

“How about when you try to humiliate the team captain just to show you can and then hit me with a killer tackle that was actually meant for him?”

“What the fuck are you on about, Stephen?” He asked, dropping his bag and putting one hand on his hips. It took him about two seconds to realize his posture wasn’t exactly a friendly one. Finnan cocked him an eyebrow as a way to prove his point. “It’s not my fault they were all acting like a bunch of twats to begin with.”

“No one was acting like a twat,” the other boy counter-argued.

“They didn’t invite me to the stupid diner either.”

“I invited you.”

“Yeah, well, you weren’t all exactly inclined to make me feel welcome, were you? You just stared at me like I was some sort of beggar pleading to be part of your little group. Even after I proved I didn’t need to beg for anything, you still didn’t care about being nice to me. So why should I?”

“That’s ridiculous! You did everything but spit on Stevie during your trial, Agger, what did you expect?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Perhaps that he wouldn’t act like a wanker before I had even started?!”

“Look, you just don’t understand, all right? We’ve had lots of false promises lately, Stevie was just being skeptical. It’s not like he’d keep you out just because he didn’t like you.”

“Good. I didn’t like him either. I just want to play football, I don’t give a flying shit about making friends with your stupid little gang.”

In a split second, the air became heavy-loaded and the laughter and the banter they’d shared just moments before died out completely. Daniel wasn’t sure, but he thought he saw something like disappointment in Stephen’s eyes. The other boy just closed his mouth, pressed his lips into a firm line and nodded his head slowly.

“All right,” he finally spoke, frostily. “Message understood.”

A tiny little voice inside of Daniel argued that that had been too insensitive, even by his own standards. He was used to being the poster boy for jerkiness in general, but it wasn’t like he was determined to go through life being rude to everyone for no reason.

As Finnan collected his jacket from the ground and put it back on, he considered all the ways he could apologize for what he had just said. It wasn’t entirely true, anyway. Well, he did think they were mostly a bunch of twats, but not all of them.

“You know,” Stephen said, cutting off his train of thought. “You’re wrong. Not all of us didn’t give a shit about being nice to you. But it turns out it’s just not worth it.”

The little voice screamed for him to stop Finnan before he left, but not a muscle was moved. He just stood there watching as the first person who had deliberately volunteered to hang out with him ever since he’d moved to Liverpool walked away, probably feeling upset and let down and most likely not willing to give it a second chance.

x-x-x

“And then in walks Carra, sees Pepe and Pennant doing their impersonation of Xabi and Stevie, and I’m not even kidding you here, he actually _screamed_!” Ginger stopped his very enthusiastic storytelling to join the others on an equally keen wave of laughter around the cafeteria table. “ _No fooking way, we ain’t ‘aving another bloody couple on this fooking team! No more fooking in the changing room!_ ” Riise added, in a very lame scouse accent.

“Wait, wait, wait,” Luis Garcia interrupted them, palms in the air to get their attention. “What were they doing exactly?”

“Well,” Riise sat straight on his chair and pulled Finns, sitting next to him, closer. “Pepe had his arm around Penns, like that.” He directed a smile to Finnan, asking for permission to proceed with the demonstration, then turned back to his audience. “But Penns was the real genius there. His head was bent this way, like he was about to kiss Pepe, pouting like Stevie does when he’s -”

“Yeah, ok, Ginger, we get it,” Finns said, pushing his friend away.

“You should’ve seen the look on his face, Luis. He was honestly heartbroken Pepe had let him down.”

“I didn’t know he placed so much trust in me,” Pepe said, stuffing his mouth with half a sandwich.

“Yeah, well. You take an entire year of Xabi-Stevie drama and you’ll be placing a lot of trust on every single straight soul you can find, too,” Sami argued.

“Hey,” a voice said, making their conversation stop abruptly. Stephen raised his head to see Agger standing next to their table, lunch tray in hand, looking from one team member to another and markedly stopping when he got to him.

“Oh, hey there, Daniel,” Sami said. “Wanna join us?”

Finnan felt the eyes of everyone else burning on him, as though asking for his ok to invite his aggressor to their table. He pretended not to notice and resigned himself to watching as Daniel picked the empty seat right in front of him.

“I could hear you guys from the classroom,” he commented as he sat. “What was that all about?”

“Ginger was telling us about Carra’s reaction when he thought we’d have another couple on the team,” Luis explained, an easy smile gracing his features.

“What do you mean _another_ couple?”

“No shit, Agger,” Pepe slammed his hand down the table. “You don’t know we have a couple?”

Daniel just shrugged in denial, but looked rather interested in hearing more about it.

“Seriously, where have you been?” Ginger asked.

“Who is it?” He turned to Finns, eyebrows popped up as though expecting him to answer.

Arbeloa exhaled loudly and spared him of having to speak to Daniel Agger again. “Stevie and Xabi, of course. King and… well, king of Anfield High. It’s good you start learning your way around this school’s aristocracy, Danny boy. You’re part of the football team now, we own this place,” the Spaniard explained, sounding just a tiny bit too over himself.

“Oh, shut it, Arbeloa.” Pepe threw a little piece of bread on his fellow countryman. “Speaking of your highnesses, where are they?”

“Training, obviously,” Sami replied.

“Training doesn’t start for another 20 minutes.”

“Training started 10 minutes ago for Stevie,” Luis added.

“We should get going, anyway. Come on, my boys.” Sami stood up, took his stuff and led the group out.

Finnan took one last bite out of his steak and then followed the others. Daniel, who hadn’t eaten half his food yet, skipped behind him to catch up.

“So,” he said, conversationally. “Who was the other couple?”

“I don’t know, I was wasting my time at the park with an arse when it happened,” he answered, dryly. “What’s up with not caring about making friends?”

“Stephen –“

“Why do you keep calling me Stephen?”

“That’s your name, isn’t it?”

“No one else calls me Stephen.”

“Are you telling me not to?”

He stopped for a moment. “No.” Another pause. “I just think it’s weird.”

“Would you prefer if I called you Finnan?”

“I’d prefer if you wouldn’t call me, to be honest.”

Daniel sighed, grabbed his forearm and halted to a stop. He waited until everyone else was distant enough so that they wouldn’t notice they’d stayed back and yanked him to the side of the hallway. Out of sheer curiosity, Finns allowed him. “Look, I know you’re mad, ok?”

“Who says I’m mad?”

“I’d be mad if I were you.”

“I’d be mad if I cared.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be a jerk to you.”

“Seriously now? Because you sounded like you knew exactly what you meant there. Bunch of twats and everything. And I’m not mad.”

Agger bit his lip and then spoke slowly, through gritted teeth, almost like it hurt him to say the words. “I don’t think you’re a bunch of twats.”

“You certainly changed your mind very fast.”

“I didn’t change my fucking mind, I just didn’t express myself well. Jesus Christ, Stephen,” he snapped.

His instinct there was to grin a grin of victory at Daniel, but he kept it to himself, crossed his arms instead and successfully maintained his poise.

“Well, express yourself again, then. I’ll give you a second to think before you speak, just in case.”

“What is this? Torture?” The Dane sounded rather annoyed, but didn’t avert his gaze. “Fuck it. Look, I just… I don’t think you’re all twats, ‘s what I meant. I had a good time last night and I didn’t mean to be an ass to you, however little I might think of some of your teammates.”

“Your teammates.”

“What?”

“They’re your teammates too.”

“So?”

“I mean you either stop talking about them that way or you might as well just move to fucking Manchester.”

“Protective, aren’t you?”

“Of the people I like, yes.”

Daniel shook his head in defeat. “Fine, sounds fair. Have it your way, Step- sorry, _Finnan_.”

“I don’t really believe you, but whatever. We’re a team, I’m gonna have to have your back when we’re on the pitch, might as well pretend you didn’t offend me and all my friends for no reason whatsoever last night.”

“You have a taste for twisting the knife, don’t you?”

“Only when deserved.”

“Are we cool then?”

Finnan squinted his eyes at him. “You’ve been here for less than six months and you already owe me many apologies. What do you think that means?”

“Not that many.”

“Many apologies indeed. I don’t think this is going to work.”

“Define ‘ _this_ ’.”

“Us, engaging in any sort of social interaction.”

“We’re interacting fine right now, aren’t we?”

“Yeah, wanna bet how long ‘till you have another reason to apologize?”

“How about you quit being a cocky bastard then?”

“Just wondering. You should too, you know. Think about it, I mean. Maybe trying to push the friendship here just isn’t going to be worth it in the future. Although quit being a cocky bastard might be a decent idea as well in your case.”

“Have you realized that there’s this weird thing that happens when you’re talking and you just start referring to something else entirely and I have no idea what is it you’re trying to say?”

“You’re a bit slow, aren’t you?”

“Maybe. Doesn’t change the fact you stopped making sense a while ago. So I’ll just ask again and we can call it a deal: are we cool? Straightforward answers only, please.”

“A little too demanding for someone who just –“

“That’s not straightforward.”

“Yes, Daniel, we’re ok.”

“Thank you, Finnan,” he said, stifling a sigh of relief.

Despite the fact it might’ve made him look slightly stupid after their whole conversation – frankly, one of the strangest ones Finns had ever had in his life -, he couldn’t help but smile. In return, he received a smile back from the Dane. Not the usual smirk or smug-tainted grin he frequently saw splayed over the other boy’s face. This one was almost… honest. Almost believable. Almost like he meant it.

“Stephen’s fine,” he added.

Daniel frowned. “Don’t do that.”

“That what?”

“Talking in the third person. You sound retarded.”

“No, I meant my name, you moron. You can call me Stephen.”

“Granting me the honor? You sure?”

“It’s more like a service. I suppose I need someone to use it or I’ll end up forgetting it.”

“Well,” Daniel said as they finally started moving again, already late for the beginning of their training session. “You won’t have to worry about that anymore, Stephen.”

x-x-x-x-x

Thinking back, if Finns had to point out the moment when his third year went pear shaped, consequently altering the flow of the rest of his high school life, it would probably be that day. If someone was to write a book on his last two years of school, this chapter would be called The Practice That Was Going Smoothly And Should’ve Been Glorious But Ended Up Screwing It All Up. It wasn’t the climax of the story, but it was certainly hinting at some strange clouds approaching.

Like most important things that are bound to change one's life, it started on a random week day. They were doing so fine on the pitch that they barely heard Rafa screaming instructions from the sidelines during the whole training session. Just as they were heading towards what should've been glorious final minutes, Daniel, ever so comfortable on the ball, advanced through midfield. Noticing what he was doing, Stephen sped up the right wing, enjoying the defense’s lack of attention, waiting for the pass to come. And, as predicted, it came, beautifully, perfectly landing on his right foot. He cut down towards the center of the box, lifted his head just that one bit to check Pepe’s position, and scored a magnificent goal.

He wasn’t one to score many goals. Could count in one hand how many he’d ever had in real matches. It wasn’t exactly the same, but he took his time to feel proud of his little achievement there. It had been truly gorgeous.

Beaming with pride, he turned around to compliment Agger on his assist but, instead of gleeful and sympathetic teammates, he found a riot starting around the midfield.

“You saw me standing there, I was waving at you!” he could hear Stevie yelling.

“So what?! Finns was better positioned than you, he scored the damn goal,” Daniel replied, not too far behind on the tone of voice.

The others were already crowding around the two of them, trying to pull them away from each other in order to stop the quarrel. But they were having none of it.

“There was no one on me, Agger!”

“Always pass it to Stevie, is that what you’re saying? What a shitty captain you are!”

“That’s not what I’m saying, you fucktard! If this was a real match situation and I was free on the head of the box, that’s the pass you should make! And you deliberately chose to ignore me, taking a million years to wait for Finns to make his run! Essien or Carrick would’ve taken that fucking ball away from you before you could even notice, shithead!”

“Hey, hey, hey! That’s done now, boys, ok?” Rafa said, popping up between them and yanking Stevie’s arm to get him away. “Great pass, Daniel. Stevie, great movement on the box. And Stephen,” Rafa called him, making everyone turn around and notice his presence for the first time since the heated discussion began. “Great goal.” The gaffer winked at him and walked away, taking Stevie with him and being immediately followed by Carra and Xabi.

Finns always imagined the day Rafa paid him a compliment would be one of the happiest of his life. He could count on one hand the times he'd seen Rafa openly congratulating someone; there was always something to be perfected. This, however, felt completely hollow, even though he knew he deserved it.

“Well,” Pepe said, taking off his gloves. “I guess this ship has sailed.”

“Hey, Finns.” Sami petted him on the back and grinned. “That was a great shot there, well done.” And then Dirk, and Luis, and Riise, and even Arbeloa and all the others, one by one, complimented him on his great piece, sounding a lot like someone paying their respect to a person who had just lost a beloved one.

Daniel went fuming back to the locker room and didn’t say a single word to him, or anyone else for that matter.

No one mentioned the incident again, but Finns kept getting these apologetic looks for the rest of the day. Like his spotlight had been stolen by a petty argument that, in reality, had nothing to do with the game and everything to do with a private competition to decide who had the bigger cock in the locker room.

He wasn’t too baffled about it until he figured that, had Stevie and Dan not started a stupid fight, he would’ve walked out of that pitch tumbling over compliments and praises, would’ve made a few jokes about how awesome he was and probably demanded someone paid him a burger and a soda later on. But that ship had also sailed. In fact, that ship never even had a chance. It sunk before it floated.

Tired of the affected looks reminding him of how brilliant the rest of the day was supposed to have gone, Finns decided to not wait on the others and just go straight to the bus stop after the last class.

And then, “Well, that bloody fucker pretty much ruined the mood for all of us,” said Agger, solidifying next to him out of thin air.

“Jesus, Daniel,” Finnan said, startled. “Where the hell did you come from?”

“Cafeteria. Was waiting for you, but you just sneaked out the back door.”

“I didn’t sneak out. I left school to go home. Through the front door, mind you. And I didn't know you were waiting for me.”

“Are you upset about what Captain Bollocks did today? He was a complete ass.”

Finns glared at him reprovingly. “I’m not upset with Stevie.” Although, maybe, he was. A little bit. But, well... It was Stevie.

“Why not? You should be! The bastard totally just stole your moment there. That was a great goal and a goddamn brilliant set up as well.”

“His complaint wasn’t directed at me.”

“Oh, so you think it’s ok for him to question my judgment like that? In front of everyone? I saw your run, I knew it was gonna work.”

Finns sighed. This was going to get ugly pretty soon if he had to start picking sides on their disputes. “I know, Dan. It was great. But he’s not completely overboard. You do have a problem with him.”

Daniel released a hoarse laugh of equal parts indignation and sarcasm that sounded more like an old dog barking. “You have got to be kidding me! I set you up on that goal and you’re taking his side?!”

“I’m not taking anyone’s side, I’m just pointing out a fact. If we had been in a real match situation, Stevie was like a 100 times more likely to get a goal there than I will ever be. I’m not saying you shouldn’t pass the ball to anyone else, but he should always be your first choice.”

“I swear to God I don’t even know why the fuck you’re standing up for him right now.”

“He’s our best player, Daniel. That’s just how things are. If you’re going to be avoiding him on the pitch, then this is not going to work out for you.”

Daniel stared at him, brutal furrows between his eyebrows, lips pressed into an annoyed pout. For a moment, Finns thought he was going to get hit. Dan was clearly hoping to find someone who he could unload his contempt for Stevie at and get some solidarity in return, and now looked something between completely disappointed and considerably crossed.

“What is up with you and Stevie?” the boy asked in a frosty tone.

Finns frowned. “What do you mean?”

“Oh, don’t act like you don’t know, Stephen. Like I never noticed the way you look at him.”

Finns stopped walking abruptly. “Excuse me?”

“You know exactly what I mean,” Daniel replied, defiantly.

“What the hell is your problem, Agger? There’s nothing up with us, I’m just being reasonable. But I suppose that concept is not very strong on you.”

“You can deny all you want, I can see it written all over your face.”

“You know what?” Finns shook his head. “You can just go fuck yourself, Daniel.”

With that, he resumed walking and made sure he wasn’t being followed this time. His heart was strangely racing inside his chest, and it was not entirely because Daniel was a complete asshole.

x-x-x

“Stephen,” his mother called from inside the house. “You have a visit!”

He was lying comfortably on a chair by the pool, reading a book and not at all bothered when Steven Gerrard crossed the door to his garden. Finns almost tipped the chair back, had to make a little effort not to lose his balance and fall.

“Stevie,” he said, a little short on breath, leaving the book on the table and standing up to greet his friend. “What are you doing here?”

“Hey there,” Stevie said, smiling bashfully. “Sorry to bother you.”

“No, not at all!” Finns was quick to deny, waving his hands for emphasis. Maybe too much emphasis. “I was just reading. It's not important.” He could've been discovering the cure for cancer and it still would've seemed unimportant in comparison. _So pathetic_ , Finns thought, and hoped he hadn't been too obvious.

Stevie nodded. “Ahm,” he started. “I just wanted to apologize for what happened today at training. I would've called, but it felt like something I should... You know… I snapped at Daniel and sounded a little like a jerk there.”

Finns raised him an eyebrow and grinned playfully. Stevie rolled his eyes. “All right, a lot like a complete arsehole.”

“Well, if you say so,” Finns added, chuckling.

“Seriously, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to say that he wasn’t supposed to pass you the ball, like, _never_. It was a great goal you scored there and I completely stole your moment. I was just angry because he’s always acting like a wanker! I was calling him and waving way before he passed you the ball and –“

Finns cut him off. “Stevie, I know. I’m not upset. I understand Daniel can be a little… Obnoxious, sometimes. He’s easily annoyed.” Stevie looked confident there for a moment, but he pressed on. “But,” he added, “I also don’t believe he did it out of spite. He may not be your biggest fan, just like you’re not his, but he takes his football very seriously. I honestly believe he just thought I was a better option at the moment.” Finns opened his arms in a way that said ‘Clearly’.

Stevie didn’t look very convinced, though. “You two have been bonding a lot lately, haven’t you?”

“We just chat, mostly.”

Stevie’s eyes narrowed in a way that made Finns almost blush. “ _Mostly?_ ”

“Not like that!” he hurried to add. It was curious, to say the least, that Daniel had accused him of having something ' _up_ ' with Stevie earlier, and now Stevie was raising doubts over the nature of his relationship with Daniel. The fact that the Dane's assumptions weren't so far off the track was irrelevant. Being the closest person to Daniel Agger on the team felt too much as though being constantly in the middle of a crossfire.

“Hm,” Stevie said. “Well, I guess you’re right. But I still don’t like his manners.”

Finns watched Stevie thoughtfully for a spell, then exhaled. “Well, can you blame him?”

“What do you mean?”

“You’re not exactly warm to him, are you? No one really is. No one talks to him, asks for his opinions. Have you ever tried to talk football with him? He's really smart, you know. He never gets invited over to the diner and sleep-overs at Carra’s and all the other team events.”

“Well, he started!” Stevie protested. “He was the one who walked into our changing room all full of himself.”

“I know, but that’s just his personality. He’s not a jerk –“ Stevie’s eyebrow shot up like an arrow. “Not _all the time_. He’s just… headstrong, same as you. Which means he’s not going to take it back either. If someone doesn’t stop this, it will just go on forever, and we need the team to be as unite- sorry, as together as we can, right?”

Stevie was silent for a moment, probably taking in his captain-like speech. Finns felt a little proud of himself. He didn’t know where all that was coming from, considering Daniel had pissed him off yet again just hours earlier, but there were obviously two sides to that coin and if he just sided up with Stevie there, then Daniel would’ve been right all along.

God forbid Daniel being right about anything.

“And what do you suggest?” Stevie finally asked.

“I don’t know, you’re the captain, you should try to make him feel more welcome. Invite him to hang out with the lads, try not to beat the crap out of him whenever you two disagree.” Finns shrugged. “Make him one of us, I guess.”

Stevie seemed to chew on the idea briefly before sighing in resignation. “I guess you’re right... God, you sounded exactly like Xabi.”

Stephen swallowed around a bitter lump in his throat, a strained smile on his face.

“I’ll see what I can do about that… But about the other thing – are you really not upset?”

“Don’t worry about it,” he said, relaxing his features to offer him an actual grin, albeit still feeling that little something tugging at his insides. “I understand.”

“I’m glad. By the way, it was a bloody brilliant goal, mate. I hope you do pull one of those out when we’re facing those Chelsea bastards next week.”

They shared a small laughter then said their goodbyes. Finns was still staring at the closed door long seconds after Stevie was gone, torn between feeling happy that he had him over or crestfallen that he left so soon.

He turned around, went back to the garden, and was quite surprised to find Daniel sitting there, waiting for him with a bored air about his face, like an apparition.

That kid have _got_ to stop doing that!

Stephen stopped, blinked once, then twice, then said, pronouncing every syllable clear and slowly, “How did you get in here?”

Daniel smirked. “Hello, Stephen.”

“Are you stalking me?”

“Your mother let me in.”

“When? I was here all along, I would’ve seen the moment you walked in.” He walked towards Daniel, but stopped at a safe distance. “Are you one of those creepy serial killers?”

“What if I am?” Daniel sniggered.

“Should I call the police?”

“Nah, I don’t wanna kill you _now_. I wanna mess with you first.”

“Oh, thank God, then.” Finns sat down on a chair opposite Daniel. “Seriously, how the hell did you get in here?”

“Your mother let me in,” Daniel repeated, than nodded his head once. “But I hid behind the bushes, so you wouldn’t know I was here.”

Finns’ eyebrow shot up. “Excuse me?”

“I saw you were with Stevie, didn’t want to intrude. So I waited for him to leave.”

“You were eavesdropping on us?”

“No, I was waiting for him to leave,” he explained. “But yeah, I did listen to your conversation. Most of it, anyway.”

Stephen gaped. “Well, for fuck’s sake, Daniel.” He let his hands fall loudly against his own thighs, gazing at the Dane in utter disbelief. There was something seriously wicked about that kid. “What the hell is your problem?”

“Hey, I didn’t come here to spy on you.” Daniel threw his hands in the air. “It just so happened that Prince Charming was here. How was I supposed to know you two were on visiting-each-other’s-houses terms?”

“Why didn’t you just show yourself like a normal person? Or waited somewhere else until we were done talking?” He stopped, then, “And we’re not on any terms, he was just here to talk about that bloody mess you two caused today.”

“I already said I didn’t want to intrude, I wasn’t thinking, just hid before anyone could see me,” he shrugged, not at all bothered by what he had just done. And then he smiled. A wide, bright grin that lit up his face and screamed of triumph.

Finns narrowed his eyes at him. “What are you smiling at?” He could swear the lad had lost it. This was one weird kid.

“You were siding with me.” Daniel spoke like a proud father who’s just seen his child riding a bike for the first time. “You told Stevie I’m a good guy.”

“Oh, you’re freaking unbelievable.” Finns rubbed his face with his hands as if that would make Daniel vanish from his garden. “I am not having a conversation with you about a conversation I had with someone else and that you were not supposed to have been aware of.”

“Then don’t, I’m just pointing out a fact. You like me.”

“You know who else might like you? A fucking psychiatrist, ‘cause you’re sure as hell a full plate of a mental case.”

“Did you notice?” He pointed a finger at Finns. “You just said ‘who else’. Which means you do like me.”

“Not anymore. I can take you assaulting me, offending me and being a general idiot, but invading my house and listening to private conversations? That’s just insane. In fact, get the hell out.” 

“It's not an invasion if your mother lets me in.”

“That’s because she doesn’t know you’re a psycho.” He forged on. “Yet.”

Daniel rested his elbow on the chair’s arm, and then his chin on the palm of his hand. He still had that calm smile gracing his face, one that appeared to be just plain psychotic to Finns, and was watching him studiously to the point of discomfort.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“Then go away.” Daniel didn’t say anything. Stephen relaxed back against the chair. “What are you doing here, anyway?”

“Came to see if you wanted to hang out.”

“Hang out?” Daniel nodded. “Hang out like what?”

The Dane shrugged. “I don’t know. What do you want to do?”

“I don’t know, you’re the one who broke into my house, you should’ve thought this through.”

“I didn’t. And I didn’t break into your house. Actually –“ Daniel turned his face a little to contemplate the construction. “House is a pretty loose description to this. Try palace.”

“It’s not a palace, it’s just a big house,” Finns said, wearily. He’d had this conversation about 50 times already. Every single person who came to his home for the first time seemed to have a remark to make about the size of it. Yeah, it was big, blablabla, he got it. It could get really old having to explain yourself about the size of your house.

“Finns, the diner is a big house. This is in a different scale.”

“A very big house.”

“Yeah, like a palace.”

“Whatever,” Finns shrugged. “I think it’s too much anyway. It’s just the three of us, we don’t need that much space.”

“How many rooms do you have?”

“Yeah, I tend to spend my time counting rooms.”

“That many then, hm?” Finns just groaned, but didn’t reply. Daniel pressed on, clearly very amused. “Do you have rooms with posh names, like Dining Room, or Library?”

Finns had to laugh at that. Posh names. “I have a TV room with a really large flat screen my mom lets me use to play videogame.”

Dan’s grin widened. “Now that’s more like it.”

“I guess we’re hanging out then.”

“Well, since you insist,” Daniel stood up and motioned for Finns to lead the way.

As soon as they got into the room, the Dane whistled and sunk down into the leather couch. “Wow,” he said, rubbing it with his hands. “This is seriously good stuff.”

“Would you drop that?” Finns asked, a hint of irritation on his tone. He was starting to get that self-conscious feeling about his family’s wealth. Again. His entire life had been about how much money his father made. And, unlike most of his parents’ posh friends, he didn’t rejoice very much on the looks he usually got. It made him overthink every single relationship he’d ever had. The day his mother agreed to let him go to Anfield High, a regular school, with regular people, was one of the happiest he could remember.

“Sorry, I really liked your couch,” Dan said, wriggling a little bit on it to hear the screeching sound of his body against the leather. “Ahh,” he mumbled, smirking. “I just had ideas.”

Stephen grimaced in disgust and went to turn the videogame on. “Say that again and I’ll definitely kick you out.”

Dan chuckled. “We can talk about something else, then,” he said tentatively. “We can talk about Stevie.”

Finns froze for a second but did his best to remain impassive. “What about him?”

“Well, what _is_ up with you two?”

“I’m pretty sure I already clarified that for you. Today, even.”

“But that was before he showed up at your house and left you gazing longingly at the door ten minutes after he was gone.”

He could feel Daniel’s inquisitive eyes on his back. He pressed his own ones shut for two seconds, then got up and walked back to the couch, sitting down next to him. “So?” Dan asked. “Not going to deny it?”

“What for? You’ll just keep repeating it anyway.”

“That’s because you haven’t been convincing enough.”

“What makes you think I have to convince you of anything?”

“You don’t, but then that just leaves plenty of room for my own assumptions, doesn’t it?”

“Are we gonna play this shit or not?” he lost his self-possession, startling Agger into sitting straight up on the couch.

“All right, sorry,” he said. “Let’s play this shit, Stephen. And I,” he stopped to pick up the controller, “am going to kick your British arse back to Scotland.”

“I’m not British. I’m Irish.”

“Same thing.”

Finns just rolled his eyes.

Once Daniel stopped being a pain in his arse, he actually turned out to be quite a good company, not to mention a real challenge on FIFA. Stevie remarks apart, Finns looked back on that night with fondness. It was the first of many spent alongside Daniel Agger.

x-x-x

 

He was still not sure what the hell he was doing by the time he had Daniel lying safely on his own bed. The only certain thing was that he’d be in serious trouble if he couldn’t clean up the mess in his father’s Mercedes. It turned out repeating _‘Don’t puke! Don’t puke!_ ’, however fervently, didn’t really seem to have much effect on completely drunk high school boys. Normally that would’ve been more than enough to send him running out in the middle of the night in desperate pursue of a way to get it fixed before anyone noticed the car was gone. Instead, there he was, two in the morning, sitting quietly by the side of Daniel Agger’s bed, watching him snoring his way into sleep.

Things had escalated pretty quickly between them. From mere teammates, to colleagues, to FIFA buddies, to... well, friends, Finns guessed. Although he didn't really know for sure until then.

 _What the hell are you doing, Stephen?_ , he asked himself quietly as he thought back on the events of that night. It started out innocently enough, but then things took on some wicked twist at some point and got completely out of hand. He wasn’t sure whether to be glad or distressed or upset or angry or – whatever. There was a myriad of things rushing through his head all at once and it was difficult enough to grab a hold of any single thing at all, even more so to try and make sense of all of it.

Daniel’s snores weren’t making it easier to concentrate, but he wasn’t sure he wanted to leave that room just yet. Not sure he wanted to concentrate at all. Concentrating could just ruin things once and for all – and then what?

 _And then what, Stephen?_ , he thought, exhaling heavily. That seemed to be the big question of the moment.

In hindsight, he should’ve seen it coming. Stevie and Xabi were, as Dirk had put it, 'disrupting the fabric of the universe by fighting more frequently than it would be advised'. Kuyt always raised the point that things were bound to go kaput when Stevie and Xabi, the center of balance of all things good and beautiful, started bickering. They were snappy and loud and arguing and acting generally weird around each other all week, culminating in a rather nasty fight that ended up with them parting ways after practice and not speaking or seeing each other again for the rest of the day.

No one ever listened to Dirk, that was the problem.

They all headed to the diner after school. All but Stevie and Xabi, of course. They just naturally assumed the pair of them had met somewhere else to talk and make peace – or sex, as Riise cared to point out, much to Carra and Pepe’s disapproval. They were fiercely against suggestions that contributed to the formation of inappropriate mental images of their teammates.

But as Finns came to find out later, they hadn’t made up. Sex hadn’t been an option either. As he made his way home and cut through the park, he found Stevie kicking a ball by himself, looking as lonely and gruesome as a high school boy can look.

Finns considered for about two minutes whether he should approach and say something or just let Stevie be. In the end, he decided to go with the polite option. Thinking back, that was the first of several wrong decisions he came to make on that night.

“Hey,” he said, smiling coyly at Stevie, who snapped his head up a little too harshly, but seemed to relax upon seeing it was just him.

“Finns,” Stevie said, curtly. “Hey.”

From that moment on, this is how the rest of the night was supposed to have gone:

Finns would ask Stevie if everything was fine, although he knew it was not. Stevie would lie and say yes, but not exactly doing a good job at it. Finns would offer to keep him company for a while, Stevie would gently decline and say he was about to go home anyway. Finns would ask one more time how he was, Stevie would say ‘Not well, but I’ll deal with it’, Finns would then express his confidence in the love he shared with Xabi – kicking himself inside and losing a little bit of soul in the process, yes, but all for a greater cause –, they’d smile, wish each other a good night and leave, each to their own way. Finns would go home, hate himself for ten minutes, eat the rest of the milk pudding he knew the cook had left for him in the fridge and then go to sleep. A few hearts broken, but no major incidents. All things considered, it would’ve been a successful night.

He wasn’t quite sure what exactly did wrong, but when he asked if everything was fine, Stevie didn’t just wave him off. He started talking. And he continued to talk. And Finns listened, and then spoke some, and then they were sharing stuff and being friendly and finding comfort in each other’s company. Maybe someone to listen was everything Stevie needed right then, and it turned out he was the first one to show up while the rest of the lads were still at the diner or getting wasted elsewhere.

In the end, they were sitting on the grass, side by side.

Stevie turned to him with a very aggravated look on his face. “So do you think I’m wrong?”, he asked. “I don’t mean to be the jealous kind of boyfriend, but Xabi can be so annoying sometimes! It’s not weird that I don’t like him hanging out with Harry all the time, is it? I mean… They used to have a _thing_! That’s not normal. Is it?”

It took Finns two seconds too long to realize it wasn’t a rhetorical question. “Ahm, well,” he stuttered. “I-I guess. I wouldn’t like to say too much because I don’t have a lot of experience on that department. But if I were you, I’d care, I guess. You never know…” He ended with a shrug, letting the thought hover in the air.

“Exactly!” Stevie agreed. “That’s exactly what I’m saying! I don’t have a problem with him being friends with Harry, but being around him all the time? I mean, they had lunch at Harry’s office at the school paper twice this week! That can’t be right. And Xabi acts like I’m just throwing a fit for no reason, keeps looking at me like I’m some kid he’s supposed to educate or somethin’, it just makes me so angry!” Stevie roared through gritted teeth.

There was a moment’s pause, during which the air seemed to shift a little bit. Stevie looked at him again, considerably less angry than a minute before, and smiled, a little embarrassed. "You think I'm silly."

"No, I don't!" Finns rushed to dismiss him. "I understand where you're coming from." Of course he did. He still remembered how he felt when Stevie started hanging out with Xabi _all the time_. The only difference was that he had no claims to make over that, unfortunately - unlike Harry, who must've felt even worse than he did.

Stevie nodded lightly. “I missed this,” he said, the gentle note on his tone connecting to a cord somewhere inside Finns.

“This?” he asked, trying to sound as casual as he could despite the fact his heart was beating way faster than it should.

“Us, hanging out… We used to do this, before. Why did we stop?”

Finns grinned awkwardly. “You found someone else to spend your time with.”

Stevie raised his eyebrows on a silent ‘Oh’. “Well, we shouldn’t have stopped,” he then added.

“It’s ok, I guess. It happens. People drift apart.”

“Yeah…” Stevie turned to him again, looked right into his eyes, searching for something. Finns had no idea what to show him, but felt his breath caught and his heart maybe skipping a beat or two, and then he made the second stupid decision of the night.

In a quick and completely inexplicable move, he leant forward and pressed his lips against Stevie’s. It was awkward and he had no idea what the hell he was doing, but he did it anyway.

As quick as it came, that crazy whim went, and he pulled away, completely terrified of what he’d done. He stared back at a completely dazzled Stevie with horror, ready to get up and run away and jump into the river Mersey to be hopefully swallowed up by a very big fish.

But perhaps the stupider decision made that night was the one that came after that, and surprisingly enough it wasn’t his.

The suddenness of the move was something slightly above bewildering and found him completely cold and stupefied. And then the heat of it hit him hard, and his heart was pounding manically in his mouth, because Stevie had just pulled him back into another kiss. A proper kiss. It was weird and too wet and their teeth were clicking and they were both trying to turn their heads to the same side, but there they were. Stephen and Steven, kissing.

They broke away for air for only a second, gazed into each other’s eyes long enough that they both were very much aware of what they were doing and all the implications of their act. But they didn’t care. The third kiss of the night soon followed, slower, calmer, less desperate and much better.

Finns knew, he _knew_ all along, even as Stevie stuck his tongue inside his mouth, that that was a 100 different shades of wrong and bound to end badly. And he still didn’t care. Because it was _Stevie_! Right there, kissing him! He’d dreamt of this moment so many times it was embarrassing. How could he care about anything else?! 

But as it turned out, he did.

His third stupid choice of the evening came after his phone started ringing. He tried to ignore it, but it’s kind of complicated to simply let a phone go on ringing when you’re making out with someone you’re not supposed to be making out with in the middle of a completely deserted park. It was just so _loud_.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he said, breaking away from Stevie to get the damn thing. Stevie just nodded, his lips red and beautiful and Jesus, how he just wanted to bite on those lips…

The ironic thing was, if it had been his mother calling, he would’ve just turned the phone off and gone back to business and then only God knows where they would've ended up. But it wasn’t. So instead, he said, “Sorry, it’s my mom, I need to take this,” and walked away to answer the phone.

It was Daniel.

“Hello?” he said, eying Stevie out of the tail of his eye, who, in turn, was eying him back the same way, both of them pretending they weren’t doing it or feeling strange at all.

“Stepheeeeeeeeeeeen!” Daniel’s unusually cheerful voice greeted him. “You took so long to pick up!”

“What is it?”

Daniel giggled. _Giggled_. Something was definitely not right. “I miss you, Stephen. You left so early!”

“Are you drunk?”

“Nooo!”

He was so drunk Finns could almost smell it through the phone. Daniel wasn’t like that when he left him at the diner with the others, but then he did mention he was heading somewhere else for ‘ _the grown up stuff_ ’.

“Ok,” Daniel admitted after a moment. “A little bit.”

Finns sighed.

"Are you busy?"

Finns glanced back at Stevie, still waiting for him to back and kiss him some more. _Jesus Christ_ , was that really happening? "Yes."

"What are you doing?"

“Why are you calling me?”

“Because…” his voice sounded extremely dragged, like he was making a huge effort to put his thoughts together. “I think I’m lost?”

“You think?”

“I’m lost.”

“Where are you?”

“Well, if I knew, I wouldn’t be calling you, would I?!” He giggled again. “Have I told you I really like your voice, Stephen?”

“Tell me something about where you are, Dan. Is there a sign or something?”

“It’s your accent,” Daniel forged on thoughtfully. “I love your accent. What is it, Welsh?”

“It’s Irish. Is there a sign?”

“Ahm…” He went quiet for long seconds. “Grey Goose.”

“That’s not a sign.”

“Well, it’s the name on the door.”

“What is it, like a pub?”

"Like a pub."

"So you're in a pub called Grey Goose," Finns repeated. Following the thought of winos was a hard task at best.

“I’m not _in_ the pub. I’m outside.” Daniel suddenly started laughing, like drunk people often do, to which Finns rolled his eyes in annoyance. But then there was a loud noise and Daniel was groaning in pain on the other side.

“Daniel? Daniel, what happened?” He waited until he heard the sound of breathing again. “Are you ok?”

“They kicked me out of the pub,” Dan said, with another chuckle. “And now I fell down. Ouch… Ouch, my hand! Fuck!”

Finns closed his eyes, sucked the air in and let it out again very slowly. He didn’t even need to think he’d regret it later, he was already regretting what he was about to say before even saying it. “Dan, just stay where you are.”

“Why?”

“I’ll pick you up. Don’t move. Don’t get up, don’t do anything. Just stay there and I’ll find you.”

He hung up and went back to Stevie, whose lips had unfortunately already paled back to their regular color. “I’m sorry, that was my mom. She’s not feeling very well, dad’s not there, I need to go home.”

The word ‘stupid’ kept flashing on inside his head.

“Oh,” the other boy said, looking honestly concerned and maybe also disappointed – or so Finns liked to believe, anyway. He felt a punch to the stomach right there. “Is it something serious?”

“No, no. I think not. She just needs me to be there.” Stevie nodded. “I’m really sorry.” He really was. He _really, really_ was. But Dan was a danger to himself and Stephen... Stephen just turned around from the object of his desire and went to rescue his friend.

As Daniel twisted in his sleep and turned around on his bed, oblivious to the fact he had company, Finns buried his face in his hands.

Years of waiting, years of wondering, years of silent observation… And he’d thrown it all out. And for what? Some instinct had kicked in the moment Daniel called, shouting at him that he was supposed to be helping his friend in distress rather than kissing rosy lips that were other people’s to be kissed. Friends before… snog partners, or whatever that had been.

He found Daniel sitting outside the pub, an empty bottle of wine in one hand, singing some lame song he didn’t know the lyrics to. The beam on his face when he recognized Finns had been so truthful and genuine it momentarily wept away the doubts the Irishman had in his head.

He borrowed his father’s car to drive downtown and make it as quick as possible. And then Daniel had puked all over the carpet and now he was screwed. But there was a little part of him feeling glad about the fact he’d done a good thing for someone else, even at the expense of a very distant dream coming true. Deep inside he knew he wouldn’t have been able to sleep well unless he knew Dan was safe and sound.

And now he was. Too bad Finns couldn’t say the same about himself.

x-x-x

Stephen looked like he’d just woken up at 9pm, sunk amidst layers of sheets and duvets on his own bed.

“Well, you look good,” Dan said by means of greeting, not bothering to ask for permission to step into his bedroom.

Stephen didn’t move a bone, his eyes flickering momentarily from the television to him, seemingly annoyed but way too lazy to actually do anything about it. “How did you get in?”

“Through the door,” Daniel explained, sitting down next to his friend, back against the header of the bed while Stephen was lying down.

“Get your dirty shoes off my bed, please. Did you break in?”

“Why would I do that?” Daniel asked, toeing off his shoes. "And why do you keep asking if I broke into your house? Do I look like a burglar?"

"Kind of."

"You hurt my feelings, Stephen."

“I didn’t hear the doorbell.”

“Your maid was outside, she let me in.”

“She’s not my maid, she’s just – housekeeper.”

“That’s very different, indeed.”

“She doesn’t like being called a maid.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

There was a moment of silence, the sound of some Latin rhythm playing as a couple did crazy acrobatic movements Daniel assumed were part of a dance step on TV being the only thing filling the room. And then, "You’re not supposed to be here.”

“Why not?”

“Well, first, I’m pretty sure I left you dead on your bed last night. Second, I’m still mad at you,” Finns spoke in a very nonchalant tone of voice.

Daniel smiled. “First, I’ve been deader than that, and second, why?”

Finns turned his face just a bit and raised his eyes at him, sending Dan a very pointed look. “You owe me a month’s allowance and the pain of being grounded for the weekend at the age of 16.”

“Wow.” Daniel’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “All that?”

“Yes, thanks to your lovely puke in my father’s car.”

“I’m sorry, Finns, drunk people are not known for being reasonable. I didn’t really know what I was doing. Only vaguely.”

“So you vaguely knew that I was shouting at your face ‘DON’T. PUKE. DON’T. PUKE.’ And you did exactly that.”

“What did I just say about reason?”

“It was the difference between you turning your face and vomiting outside the car, on the pavement, or inside the car, all over my weekend.”

“I’m really, really sorry.”

“Sure.” Finns crossed his arms under his head and turned back to the TV.

The Dane exhaled, part guilty, part just plain bored. He had gone out to get completely stinking drunk the night before for the sheer hell of it and it was absolutely not in his plans to call Stephen at any given point of the night. In fact, if he had to be honest, he was sort of planning to score with someone else. Anyone else. It had been a very long time since he last had pleasures of the more libidinous breed. Not that he was an addict or anything. Well, ok, he was. A little bit. He could control himself, but he’d just rather not. And being in a different country, where he didn’t know nearly enough people and didn’t like half the ones he did, it made things considerably more complicated.

He gathered up the courage to ask Stevie about places to go. The guy was practically royalty in Liverpool, he should know. He hadn’t been with Xabi forever, right? Daniel had to admit that, for five seconds there, he regretted it fiercely. The look on the captain’s eyes when he told him he was into guys was something above embarrassing. Stevie didn’t know whether he wanted to laugh or just look shocked, but eventually he gave Dan the directions he wanted. As it turned out, it just wasn't worth it.

What Daniel came to find out was that people in Liverpool really are just boring, no matter where you go. It was like walking into a bar full of Steven Gerrards and homosexual Jamie Carraghers. Every once in a while there was the odd foreign student, but they all did seem to love their Steven Gerrards, didn’t they? It took him so long to finally get interested enough in someone to make a move that he was completely sodden by then. So maybe the person wasn’t even that interesting anyway.

What did happen was that, between getting inebriated and turned off, Daniel decided to call the only person in that city he actually truly liked. At first he had no idea why - and yes, he wasn’t at all in his best senses, but he was an experienced drinker despite his young age and he had plenty of notion of everything he did and mostly why he did it, so in the end he was happy he called Finns. Mainly because he showed up, which was also not part of his plan, just one of those fortunate turn of events on a drunken night. At least for him, not so much for Finns, apparently.

He would’ve gladly done Finns, by the way. And he wouldn't even need to be drunk for that.

And that was when a bright, shiny idea sparkled to life on his brilliant mind.

Daniel took the remote control and turned the TV off, elbowing Finns to get his attention. “Hey!”, the Irishman glowered at him. “I was watching that!”

“Oh, forget it, Finns,” he said, grinning widely at his friend. “Let me make it up to you.”

Finns narrowed his eyes at him suspiciously. “How?”

“Well, where are your parents?”

“Out.”

“Where?”

“I don’t know, fancy party somewhere.”

“How long does it usually take?”

Finns weighted his answer for a long second. “I’m afraid to tell you.”

“Just say it!”

“All night. Why?”

Daniel laughed, clapping his hands once in triumph. “Brilliant!”

Finns sat down on the bed, facing Dan with a very strange look on his face. “Are you still drunk?”

“Never been more sober.” Not a lie. “Let me take you out.”

“I’m grounded, Daniel.”

“Well, who’s watching you right now?”

Finns considered it for a moment. “I'm listening.”

“Come on, let me repay you for your effort last night, I’m really grateful, you know. I’ll take you out to have some fun! You look like you need it.”

Finns eyes narrowed to a slit. “Are you saying fun like… _fun_?"

"I don't know what you mean, Stephen."

"Like... a brothel?”

Daniel’s brow furrowed. “What?” And then he had to laugh out loud. Sometimes Finns acted like such a little virgin Dan just wanted to jump him and wipe that innocence off of him, preferably with his tongue. There was only a small side of him that felt bad about having that kind of thought regarding Stephen. He was, after all, the only friend he’d managed to make so far. It felt wrong to want to bed his only friend. But then again, back in Denmark Daniel had bedded pretty much all his friends – some before they became friends, some many times afterwards.

“Oh, Stephen, Stephen, Stephen…” He shook his head. Finns just deadpanned at him. “If I wanted to take you out for the brothel kind of fun, I wouldn’t take you out at all. We wouldn’t even need to get out of your bed,” he explained, calmly, and smiled at the way Finns’ face became positively red. “You’re too adorable. Where do you get that kind of idea from, anyway?”

“Shut up, Daniel,” he scowled, and turned his look elsewhere.

“Ok, listen. No, not a brothel. Let’s go out, get something to eat and then have some drinks.”

“Drinks?”

“Drinks.”

“You want to go out for drinks after last night?”

“I’m really tough. But I won’t be doing the drinking, you are. I’ll stay sober. Ish. You know. To make sure you get home safely. I,” Daniel said, with an overly flowy movement of his hand to touch his own chest, “am willing to make that sacrifice for the sake of you having a good night. You deserve it.”

“And how exactly can you guarantee you’ll manage to stay sober?”

Daniel sighed. “Stephen, you are talking to a pro here. Please show some respect.” Finns tried to hold back, but eventually the smile broke its way onto his face. Daniel had never really noticed the dimples on his cheeks. He really did look kind of adorable, which made him feel slightly odd about having improper ideas. Finns was almost too innocent for him. And probably not the type he’d usually go for, but there was just something about him… The way he looked completely delicious but seemed to have no idea of that whatsoever. Or maybe it was just that he was not at all interested. Daniel had a passion for capture.

“What do you say?” he asked.

Finns pondered the idea for a bit longer, staring right into his eyes with a bunch of threats and another dozen doubts, but, at last, he sighed and gave in. “I’m so going to regret this,” he said, but got out of the bed nonetheless and went to the ensuite. “I’ll get dressed.”

Daniel watched him shut the door behind him, gloating in triumph. Standing up, he took his pack of cigarettes and lighter from his pockets and lit up one, taking a long drag and letting the smoke out slowly.

Not a minute after, he heard a chirpy little song playing, the muffled sound coming from somewhere under the million blankets on Finns’ bed. Putting the cigarette in his mouth and holding it there with his lips, Daniel searched through the bed until he found Stephen’s mobile. The name Stevie was shining bright in blue light on the screen.

Daniel considered for a quick second whether he should take the call for Finns or not, but before he could decide, the Irishman came out of the bathroom. He turned the mobile to him, showing it was Stevie, and saw something akin to terror flickering through Finns' eyes.

“Daniel, give me tha-“

Too late, he’d taken the call. Finns immediately jumped him and battled his arms fiercely to snatch the phone away. At first, Daniel thought it was some kind of funny thing, like when you’re a kid and your dad won’t give you the toy you want and will just pass it from one hand to the other while you try to catch it. It didn’t take long, however, for him to realize there was nothing playful about the way Finns threw him against the wall and held his wrist tight until his fingers slackened around the mobile.

Finns eyed him with simmering fury as he put the phone on his ear and walked away. “Hello? Hi, Stevie, sorry about that…” and then he locked himself in the bathroom again.

Daniel, who had no shame whatsoever, threw his cigarette out the window and hurried to glue his ears to the door.

“The doctor said mom's going to be fine, but she’s still not feeling very well, I’m afraid,” he heard very clearly, however muffled. “No, I’m sorry, I can’t go out tonight, I have to stay with her. Dad’s not in town.” Another pause. “I know… We probably should. I’ll call you, or we’ll figure something out at school.” Pause. “Ok. Bye.”

When he opened the door again, Finns flinched upon finding Dan standing guard right outside his bathroom, and then frowned. “Were you eavesdropping?”

“Didn’t have to, you’re loud when you’re angry.”

Finns’ lips pressed into a very thin line. “What the hell is your fucking problem?! That’s the second time you do that!”

He didn’t try to defend himself, just shrugged. There were more important points about that conversation to be addressed. “Sorry about your mom.”

“Shut up,” Finns said, and gently pushed Daniel out of the way to walk past him. Good thing he could manage to stay non-violent even when he was pissed.

“Are you honestly not going to tell me what the fuck was that all about?”

“It was about you being nosy and answering my phone.”

“Really? And may I ask who is being lied to? Are your parents out on a ball or is your mom terribly sick and your dad out of town? Because if that’s the case, then you’re a really bad son.”

Finns sighed, clearly annoyed and still not looking at him. “They’re out and mom’s not sick.”

“So…?”

“So what?”

“So why would you tell that to Stevie? Actually, why would you tell him that your mom is _still_ sick? When was she first sick?“

“Daniel, stop it.” Finns placed both his hands on his hips, impassiveness written all over his face, annoyance glittering through the dark blue of his eyes. “It’s none of your business. I wasn’t lying to you, that’s all you need to know.”

“Finns-“

“No. I said drop it.”

They engaged in a silent battle, eyes not even blinking; Finns waiting for resignation, Daniel wondering whether he was just curious or if that agitation at the pit of his stomach could be a sign of some other sort of feeling.

With a sigh, he surrendered. “Fine.”

“Good. Can we go now?”

“Fine,” Daniel repeated, bit his lower lip, tried to hold back his tongue, couldn’t really do it. “Stephen, seriously. I’m going to make you this question just this one last time and whatever you answer me, I’ll leave it, but I’m hoping you’ll make it convincing this time.” Finns put on his jacket and waited for the question to come. “What is up with you and Stevie?”

“I'm starting to run out of imaginative ways to answer you that."

"How about being imaginatively honest?"

"There is nothing up, Dan. We’re friends, we’ve known each other for a long time, that is all.”

“You call what just happened here nothing?”

“It’s nothing like you’re thinking, anyway.”

“Are you sure? Would you like me to spell out for you what I’m thinking?”

“No!” he answered in a hurry. “Of course I’m sure.” Finns picked up his phone, tucked it into his jacket’s pocket, and then sniffed the air. "Didn’t I tell you not to smoke in here? My mother can smell that stuff miles away, she’ll ship me over to a boarding school if she finds out someone’s been smoking inside her house.”

“Won’t happen again.”

“It better not, or you’ll have to think of a hell of a better way to make it up to me than taking me out for drinks - and paying for it, by the way.”

 _Well_ , Daniel thought, _I could think of a few ways, Stephen_.

x-x-x-x-x

 

The club was buzzing with people and noise. He could hear the music playing from the street. Harry paraded by the long line of short-skirted girls and hopeless young men with a confident little grin gracing his blessed features as he proceeded straight to the entrance. It only took him a wink to the doorman and he was through. Connection was everything.

Yeah, ok, almost everything. There was an important role there being played by charm as well.

Charm opened lots of doors when well used and he’d dare to go as far as to say no one knew how to make good use of the weapons nature had armed him with better than Harry Kewell.

He gave a cursory once over around the club; crowded, as he’d predicted. A few familiar faces, many possible prospects. Harry opened a cheeky grin; this was going to be a good night.

He went to the bar to get something to start off his night. Lucas Neill, the bartender, was one of his closest pals. Harry thought it was a shame he was so keen on going exclusively for women, but as long as he continued to provide him with booze, Harry could deal. 

He turned around to check the dance floor again as he waited for his drink and spotted a well-known figure sitting alone just a few stools away. Collecting his glass, Harry moved over.

“Hey!” he called, grinning up to the kid. “It’s Daniel, right?”

Daniel blinked at him once, then nodded politely. “Hey, Harry.”

“You’re new here,” he asserted with the conviction of one of the club’s most loyal customers. “What are you doing there, by yourself? Need a hand getting around?”

“Nah,” Daniel dismissed him, taking a gulp of his own drink. Didn’t look like he'd had many so far. Harry could sense alcoholic vulnerability miles away, this wasn't it. “I’m on duty tonight.”

Harry’s eyebrow lifted in inquiry. “Duty?”

“I’m babysitting.” Daniel motioned with his head towards the dance floor. It didn’t take Harry too long to recognize Steve Finnan dancing like there would be no tomorrow, sandwiched between two girls.

“Is that…” he started, just as Finns made a twist and pressed himself behind one of the girls, his hands sliding up her waist as they moved to the beat. “Wow,” Harry said, laughing shortly. That was... Well, impressive. “Steve Finnan. Right under our noses all this time. Who would’ve guessed?”

Daniel just snorted, his eyes trained on the trio. Harry didn’t really want to look away either; it was hot stuff going on right there. But the other boy didn’t exactly seem to be attracted by the sexual tension on the dance floor. Quite the opposite.

“Did his parents hire you to watch him?”

“I promised I’d stay sober enough to take him home before someone finds out he's gone.”

“I see.” Harry drank from his glass. “Why are you not there then?” he asked, nodding towards the floor.

Daniel glanced away from his friend to direct him a frown. “What kind of babysitter would I be if I took advantage of his state? He’s having fun.”

“Oh, no denying that,” Harry smirked, watching as Finns laughed at something one of the girls said on his ear.

He finished his drink and turned around to ask for a second one when he heard the inebriated and distinct Irish accent of his classmate. “Daaaaaaaaniel!”

He saw as the boy approached the two of them, a huge beam lighting up his face, and planted a loud smack on Daniel’s cheek.

“Why are you sitting here like an old man, Daniel? The night’s young! Let’s have- wooah!” Finns lost his balance and nearly tumbled down, but his arm found Harry next to him and held onto his neck to keep from landing on his ass. He laughed drunkenly and turned to face him, his eyes wide with surprise upon recognizing his savior. “Harry! What are you doing here?! Look, Daniel, it’s Harry! Hi, Harry.” 

“Hello, Finns,” he replied amusedly.

He and Finns had played together for two years on the team, up until the point he had to leave the squad due to a recurring injury. Harry loved football, but after a while it just stopped being worth it. All the time he lost on recovery and physical therapy eventually took its toll. He discovered several more interesting things he could be doing rather than brooding and feeling sorry for himself. Running the school paper was amongst those. 

Finns also had several classes with him, being that they were both third years. But for whatever reason they never became too close. Probably because Finns was Steven Gerrard’s party liner. Not that he had ever done or said anything to prove it, but Harry naturally drifted away from all the Stevie fans to avoid problems. It took him a lot of restrain not to actually jump the guy’s neck and break a bone or two.

Years later and he still got riled up just thinking about it.

“You look good, Finns. Breaking some hearts on the dance floor.” It was so effortless for him to flirt sometimes he did it without noticing. He wasn’t exactly hitting on Finns there, or planning on scoring, but there was a drunk guy in his arms. Instinct immediately started kicking in – and how come he’d never noticed Finns was rather good looking before?! 

“I’m on fire, Harry!” Finns said, letting go of him and taking a second too long to manage to stand still. “Heeeey, look!” he said, as the two girls who had been dancing with him approached them by the bar. They weren’t nearly as drunk as he was, but both looked thrilled to be keeping the Irish boy company.

They had a point, Harry thought.

“Girls, these are Harry and Daniel,” he introduced them. “Daniel is from Denmark! He’s a Viking! He's got a whole cemetery of them on his back! Show them, Daniel!”

"Yeah, show them, Daniel!" Harry indulged for the sheer hell of it. And maybe because he didn't think it would be half bad to check out said Vikings. Daniel shot him a very reproving glance and looked away, like he had nothing to do with the conversation, but the girls eyed him with a lot more interest. Daniel just smiled politely at them. 

Girls were not his thing then, the Australian decided. 

Harry was game for almost anything, and right there was a very good opportunity to score with the best of both worlds. But if he had to pick, he’d go with Finns too. The way his shirt was clinging to his body, how his skin was glowing with the sweat from all the dancing… He had to give Daniel some credit for being so contained. 

Finns was oblivious to the fact he was begging to be snogged, which made it all even more alluring. 

Daniel was a much better friend than he would ever be, clearly.

“This is Mary,” Finns pointed to the dark haired one, who smiled at both of them and touched Finns’ lower back, letting her hand linger there just a little bit longer than strictly necessary. “And…” The Irishman narrowed his eyes, biting his lip. “Don’t tell me, I’ll get it… It’ssss… Christie!”

“Chrissie,” the blondish one corrected him with a giggle. 

“Aw, fuck! So close.” Finns shrugged. “Well, I’ll just have to drink then.” He took the glass out of Dan’s hand, saluted him and chugged the whole thing.

“Hey! That was mine!” Dan protested, but hurried to get the glass out of his friend's fumbly hands.

“What is mine is mine, amigo.” Finns paused. “No, that didn’t sound right. What is mine… No. What is yours… Ah, screw it.”

“Don’t you think you had too much to drink already?” Harry asked.

Finns snorted. “Pffff! Too much! Tell him, Dan!”

“You had too much to drink,” the Dane agreed.

“No, I didn’t! I’m tough! Like a Viking!”

Daniel rolled his eyes, but Harry had to laugh. Drunk Finns was fun!

“Oh my God!” The Irishman exclaimed, jumping from one subject to the next at the speed of light. “I love this song!” he started bouncing. “Let’s dance, Dan!”

“I’m not much of a dancer.”

“Oh, come on, Daniel,” Harry said, trying to play the middle man there. “He loves the song! You can’t deny him that dance.”

“Let’s goooo, Dan!” Finns took his friend’s hands and tried getting him out of his bar stool, but Daniel just refused to get up.

“Nah, I’m fine.”

“You’re such a spoilsport! Harry,” Finns then turned to him. “Dance?”

Ohh, that was… Harry’s first instinct would be to jump at the opportunity. But he spared a second to look at Daniel, sitting stiff next to him, hands balled in fists, glowering.

With a defeated sigh, he shook his head. “Gonna have to pass. But the girls are gonna take good care of you, aren’t you, girls?”

Mary and Chrissie – or was it Christie? – pulled Finns back to the dance floor and in a minute he wasn’t remembering either him or Daniel anymore, falling once again into his routine of sex-dancing with his two admirers. 

“That’s a serious offense, if you ask me,” Harry commented.

“What?”

“Letting a hot guy go away like that. Such a waste…” Harry shook his head slowly, while Daniel just turned around to get another drink for himself.

“Well,” he continued, picking up his glass from the counter. “If I were you, I’d let him sweat on that song and then I’d take him home,” Harry advised. “Finns won’t offer any resistance to the next guy who approaches him, and I have a feeling no one else will give a flying shit about his brooding boyfriend here at the bar.”

Daniel grimaced. “He’s not my boyfriend.”

“Really? Could’ve had me fooled.” Harry smirked again at him, winked and walked away.

If he wasn’t going to get Finns laid, then he hoped at least Daniel wouldn’t let the opportunity slip. Kids these days…

x-x-x

There was very little dignity in carrying another man up the stairs, but Finns’ legs were like jellyfish. He had one arm over Dan’s shoulder but was doing very little part of the job on staying up.

“Come on, Finns, we’re almost there.”

Daniel wasn’t complaining. It was his idea. If anything, he shouldn’t have let Finns run wild like he did. He thought it to be a good idea at the moment – have Finns drunk and letting go of his always composed and well-kept façade, having fun, laughing, dancing… whatever. But as it turned out, certain things were supposed to stay as they were. Once you let Finns on the loose, there was no way to get him back until he was too drunk to actually fight you. And then it was too late.

Dan was considering himself lucky enough his parents weren’t home yet.

Finns was humming a song, head leaning against his shoulder, eyes closed as they walked slowly up the stairs. “You’re gonna wake someone up.”

“The maid’s not home,” he replied between waves of laughter, dragging his words and finding it all so very amusing.

“I thought you said she was a housekeeper.”

Finns frowned, but didn’t open his eyes. “That’s stupid. It’s the same thing.”

As soon as they made it to Finns’ bedroom, Dan laid him down and took a moment to recover. His arms were aching like fuck, his neck felt stiff like he’d fallen asleep on a very small chair. He turned his head to both sides, cracking the bones, before looking down on a sleepily smiley Stephen.

“What?” he asked.

“I had a good night.” He giggled. “Thank you, Mr. Agger.”

All the ache, the trouble he’d gone through to get Finns home and the time he spent worrying his friend would end up getting himself raped on the dance floor completely vanished right there, disappearing somewhere between the corner of Finns’ lips and the happy glow on his eyes.

He looked rather beautiful so thoroughly satisfied.

“Well,” he started, sitting on the edge of the bed to take off Finns’ shoes. “I aim to please.”

“You peased. Plused. Pised. Plo… I forgot how to say that word.” He paused. "What was the word again?"

Dam chuckled, then turned to the other side and patted Finns on the leg. “Come on, we have to get you out of that shirt.”

Finns started laughing like a maniac, but sat down on the bed and put his arms up. “That’s very inappropriate.”

“You’ll see what’s inappropriate when your mother smells the alcohol and the cigarettes on your shirt. Put those arms down, it’s a button shirt.”

Under the persistent eyes of his Irish friend, Daniel undid button by button, then slid the shirt out of Finns’ shoulders and arms and threw it on the floor. 

“My work here is done, sir,” he announced, grinning. “Delivered safe and sound. Well… You’ll be sound in the morning.”

“You deserve a reward.”

“Do I?” Daniel’s eyebrows shot up as several fitting possible rewards occurred to him. He felt slightly like a jerk for thinking he would be totally willing to take Finns in the state he was, but sod it.

The other boy nodded and lay back down on the bed, watching him from under his long lashes. “I’m gonna tell you a secret.” Stephen lifted one finger and curled it towards him, calling Daniel to approach. When he was close enough, the older boy whispered, “I kissed Stevie.”

The ‘secret’ cut through him like someone had just dumped a bucket of melting ice cubes over his head.

“You did what?”

Finns snorted. “Kissed. S. T. E. I. V. E. Wait… That’s wrong. S. V… T…"

"Finns, what do you mean you kissed Stevie?" Dan asked again with a hint of urgency, not letting Stephen lose his focus. 

"Shhhhhhhhhhh! It’s a secret. No one knows.”

“When was that?”

“Last night. I was with Stevie and then I kissed him and then _he_ kissed _me_ , and then we were _both_ kissing. And he’s suuuch a good kisser…” Finns touched his own lips and closed his eyes, probably remembering his passionate moment with the captain. There was a part of Daniel that wanted to believe it was the booze talking, but he knew Finns was telling the truth. It added sense to the scene he’d witnessed earlier.

He felt a bit of a stab somewhere, felt weird and funny and oddly disturbed by the piece of information his friend had just shared. He’d spent the entire night weighting how much of an asshole he’d be if he snogged Finns just to find out he’d been daydreaming about none other than Steven fucking Gerrard.

“And then you called,” Stephen finished.

“You were with Stevie when I called you?” Finns nodded, nuzzling his head on the pillow. “You left to go pick me up and told him your mother was sick.” Finns giggled in confirmation. “So you wouldn’t have to tell him you were leaving because of me.”

Finns opened his eyes again and looked up at him. “Are you mad?”

Was he? “I don’t know.”

“Then why do you look like that?”

“Like what?”

“Like you want to punch me,” Finns concluded with a short laugh.

That he did. “Because you shouldn’t be kissing Steven Gerrard.”

“Who should I be kissing then?”

Well, fuck. 

He didn’t even think, just dove in and pressed his lips furiously against Finns’. It was harsh and angry and he had no idea why in hell’s name he was doing it. To compete with Stevie? To prove he was better than the captain? Soon enough Finns was kissing him back, making little moaning sounds against his mouth, and it didn’t matter anymore. His friend’s uncertain but eager tongue was searching for his, demanding contact and deepening the kiss and it took Daniel a moment too long to realize how wrong that was.

Stephen looked up at him confused and breathless, half-way between falling sleep and waiting for him to kiss him again.

“I have to go,” Daniel said, petting Finns’ head. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Dan placed a little peck on his lips, just for the sake of it, turned off the lights and left.

x-x-x

A head banged hard against the locker right next to his; a loud thud filling the still not so crowded hallway first thing in the morning.

It took Stephen long delayed seconds to say, “Ouch,” dragging the words out like they were scratching his throat. He had his eyes scrunched shut, his complexion paler than the usual. “I can’t feel my brain.”

Daniel smiled. “Looking good, sunshine.”

“What the hell did you do to me?”

“I gave you a fantastic night to be remembered.”

Finns opened his eyes, not without some effort, and turned his face to look at him without taking his forehead from the locker. He looked so miserable, as though he’d just come from the faraway land of the reluctantly living, Daniel almost pitied him. Just almost. 

“I’m pretty sure you also gave me all the alcohol in the world, because fucking Jesus…” He rolled his forehead against the cool steel of the locker door. “Definitely not a night to remember though.”

“What are you talking about? You were having crazy fun.”

“I should hope so. I hope I had the best night of my life, because this hangover has to be worth something. But I sure as hell can’t remember it.”

Dan cocked him an eyebrow. “You don’t remember last night?” Finns just shook his head. “Nothing? At all?”

“Nope.”

“Jesus, Stephen. Next thing you’re gonna tell me you’re a virgin.”

Finns stopped moving his head, staring at him out of the corner of his eyes. Daniel was pretty sure he was still a virgin, but he had never asked. 

“Although,” he started, thoughtfully. “Nah, a virgin would never… No.”

Confused creases appeared between the Irishman’s eyebrows. “Never what?”

Daniel shrugged. “You sure you don’t remember? I find it hard to forget.”

The older boy pushed away from the locker, standing up straight and tense. “Forget what, Dan? What happened?”

“You really want to know?”

He paused. “Yes?”

“Well.” The Dane moved into Stephen’s personal space, their faces so close they were almost touching. Nervous, Finns took a step back to get away, but instead found himself cornered when his back hit the locker. Daniel caged him between his arms, one on each side of his shoulders, looking him straight in the eye. “You are honestly going to tell me you don’t remember pushing me against the wall, like that –” and he pressed up against Finns, one leg between his. “I said, _‘Stephen, your parents are going to be home anytime now’_ , and you said _‘I don’t care, Dan’_. You see, you were very, very persistent last night.” He moved forward just an inch, his lips ghosting over Finns’, moving down, to his chin, neck, and then up again, nearly touching his ear. 

He grinned, although Stephen couldn’t see it. The poor kid was terrified, petrified like a statue, cheeks blushing so deeply it looked as though he’d been slapped. He had the biggest eyes the Dane had ever seen, and they were wide with naked, vulnerable shock. But Dan could feel his heart racing, beating rapidly, could sense his breath faltering. 

“I said _‘Not in your parents’ room, Stephen’_ , but you threw me down on the bed, and you jumped over me. And then you said, _‘I want you, Daniel’_.” His lips were almost touching Finns’ ear when he spoke. “ _’I want you’_ ,” he repeated. “And then you kissed me,” he moved to face him again, stopping only a breath away from contact. Finns had paled to insubstantiality. “You kissed me so hard and so deep I lost my breath, Finns. You could’ve got me killed there.”

Stephen’s mouth opened, his lips looking dry and uncertain. He tried to speak, but all that came out was a strangled sound. He looked so adorable right there it took a lot of guts not to really kiss him, but then it was too much and he couldn’t hold it anymore. The Dane started laughing, leaning his head against Finns’ shoulder. 

“What? What, why are you laughing?” he asked.

“You should see your face now, Stephen!”

Stephen pushed him away with little care. “You’re a fucking arsehole, you know that? I’ll never let you get me drunk again, you dickhead.”

“Oh, come on. You have to admit it was good.”

“Shut up, Daniel.” He was angry, yes, but his face was still burning. “You better pray no one paid attention to your stupid scene. If I so much as-“

Finns stopped talking mid-rant, and Dan only had to follow his eyes to find out why. Steven Gerrard was coming down the hallway with Carra and Sami.

“Hm,” Daniel said, his mood taking a turn downwards. “Still can’t face him?”

Finns gazed at him in shock for a second, before connecting the dots. Drunks were known for being big sharers, after all. “I can’t believe I told you that.”

“I didn’t even have to ask, imagine that. You were dying to tell the news,” he rolled his eyes.

“Look, don’t – Just – Don’t mention this to anyone, ok? No one’s supposed to know.”

“Not like I go out sharing secrets with the lads, is it?” he shrugged. “But you should go talk to him.”

“Why?”

“Why?” Daniel’s eyebrows rose. “You clearly have to fix this.”

“I will. Just – Not now, I forgot something I have to go get. I’ll see you later.”

Before he could even protest, Finns had already pivoted back down the hall.

 

x-x-x

 

Showing up for practice was definitely a bad idea then.

Finns took a moment to dwell on the possibility of feigning illness and skipping activities. It would not only save him the pain of feeling his brain rocking inside his skull as he ran on the pitch, but also keep him from having to face much worse issues.

But then Daniel – all bad ideas started with Daniel these days, it seemed – had to come and sweet-talk him into “being a man”.

“Go on, Stephen!” he said, hands on his shoulders like a soldier trying to encourage another one to make a run into the battlefield. “You’ll never be a real footballer until you’ve showed up for practice with a fucked up hangover! That’s how the pros do.”

“In Denmark, maybe.”

“Everywhere in the world. Stop whining, you’re a man now!”

“I don’t want to be a man!” he argued, then went over what he had just said. “That didn’t come out right.”

And so Daniel had won the argument and he’d showed up for the worst 60 minutes of his life. Rafa was yelling at him, sometimes right at his face, and he just wanted to drop down on his knees and beg for mercy.

But he held on, mostly by staying away from the action and doing as little running as he could. Every now and then Pepe would skip over to where he was, place a hand on his shoulder and ask with concern bleeding all over his voice, “Did you have a skunk for breakfast, Finns?” or “Are you sure you didn’t eat a skunk? You look like you’re going to pass out.”

Finns turned his face to the skies, looking at the dark clouds above. “Take me, God,” he pleaded. “Take me now. I’m yours. Free me from this pain.”

Stephen would always remember that moment as the point where he: a) was definitively convinced of the existence of God; and b) found out that He had a very dark sense of humor.

When he prayed for salvation during Mr. Moyes' test, or when he broke his mother’s Chinese vase and prayed for a miracle to put it together, then God wasn’t listening. But when he asked to be taken, He said ‘With pleasure’.

It was so fast he didn’t even see where the ball came from. All he knew was that it hit him right between the eyes, a power shot that could probably kill a small animal, and sent him straight to the ground. 

Everything became impossibly bright. He could feel his brain shaking. Slowly, he started blinking, and then things were resolving back into focus, dots of color dancing all around him.

“Ouch,” he said, once he felt he was capable of putting words together again. “Jesus Christ.”

“Are you ok?” it was Daniel, kneeling down next to him and putting a hand on his forehead. “Can you see me?”

“I can see both of you.”

“I yelled at you to get out of the way, Finns.” Xabi now. “I’m sorry.”

Xabi hit him with the ball. Wasn’t that just perfect? In between blurry images and pain, he wondered whether it had been on purpose. Maybe Stevie told him?

“I knew you weren’t feeling well.” Pepe. “It was the skunk.”

"What skunk?" Ginger's voice.

"He ate a skunk."

"He ate a skunk?!"

"What kind of person eats a skunk?" Kuyt asking.

Finns grabbed Daniel's shirt and pulled him down on a desperate plea. "For fuck's sake. Please, make them stop," he mumbled under his breath.

“Do you need a nurse, Stephen?” Rafa asked.

“No, I think I can –” he tried to sit down and would’ve fallen back, but Daniel caught him and held him there until he wasn’t seeing double anymore. “I think I’m fine.”

“Sure you are,” Daniel said, and pulled him up on his feet. “Come on, I’ll take you to the infirmary.”

Dan put one of his arms over his shoulder and helped him walk to the changing room. It was harder standing up than he would’ve thought. The Dane sat him down on one of the benches and brought him a bottle of water.

“Here, drink this.”

He took a large gulp and then poured the rest on his face. “God did this to me, Dan,” he said.

“Don’t blame God for your hangover.”

“I don’t blame God for that. The hangover is your fault.”

Daniel shrugged. “Feeling better?”

“A little. I just need a minute.” He closed his eyes and leaned back against the wall, taking a deep breath. “I shouldn’t have come to training today,” Finns stated. “That’s also your fault.”

“So now I’m responsible for every shit that happens to you? Didn’t realize I had a baby.”

“Not every shit. But most shit, yes.”

“Are you going to blame me for making out with Stevie too?”

That sent an arrow right through his chest. His eyes shot up and he gave Daniel an icy gaze. “Don’t start with that, Dan. My head's not fully functional.”

“I’m not starting anything.”

“I’m not going to discuss that with you. You weren’t even supposed to know.”

“You shouldn’t have told me then.”

“I was drunk.”

“Not my problem.”

“You got me drunk!”

“Yes, to make you relax, no to get dirty secrets out of you. That part you did all by yourself.”

“Whatever!” he nearly shouted and heard his own voice echoing inside his skull. “You have nothing to do with that, act like you don’t know.”

“Then you should start acting like it doesn’t mean anything.”

“Not discussing, Dan.”

“You ran away from Stevie this morning, hid during the rest of the day and didn’t let him come near you outside.”

“That’s none of your business,” Finns spoke in a clipped, measured tone. Why was Daniel so keen on talking about it? He sure as hell wasn’t!

“Stephen, please,” he approached him, leaning forward and placing both hands on his knees. “You can’t do this, ok? Stevie is with Xabi, he loves Xabi, everyone knows this. Don't fall for him.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, Daniel.”

“I’m serious.”

“So am I! Drop it!”

“I can’t! You’re being weird! You need to let it go! Talk to Stevie, get over this, I’m sure you can work it out, but please, you have to get over it!”

Before he could use less than polite words to answer Daniel, the door sprung open and Stevie walked in. He stopped, dead on his tracks, eyes going from Finns to Daniel and back again, until the Dane stood straight and took a step away. 

“Imagine that,” Dan said.

“Hey,” Stevie spoke. "Am I..." he trailed off, arching his eyebrows to complete the sentence for him.

"Not at all, Stevie! Please, come in! Join us!" Daniel replied with a stilted smile and an overly blithe voice that made him sound more intimidating than anything. 

“Ahm..." Stevie turned to Finns then. "Are you ok?”

“I’ll be fine,” Finns answered, curtly. 

“Did you go see the nurse?”

“Not yet.”

“Do you need-“

“I’ll take him,” Dan cut him off. “It’s ok.”

Stevie nodded once. “Ok. Then… Just let me know. When you know. If you’re going to be fine.”

“Sure.”

He turned around and left just the two of them again. Finns exhaled loudly, brushing a hand through his hair.

“That wasn’t awkward at all,” Daniel said.

Finns bit the inside of his lip to keep from shouting. “Why, Daniel?” he asked, keeping his tone under control. “Why are you doing this? Why can’t you try to be a little encouraging for once?”

“I am being encouraging!” the Dane retorted. “I’m encouraging you to go talk to him, which is what you have to do.”

“I don’t need you to tell me what to do.”

“Finns, listen-“

“No, you listen!” His voice was stern and cold now. “I’m sick of this. If you don’t have anything good to say, then just shut the fuck up. I don’t need to get lectured on how to deal with my shit by someone like you. You should try fixing your own problems before addressing mine! I never asked for your help, I don’t need your help, so back off and leave me the fuck alone!”

Stephen didn’t know something could hurt Daniel until he did.

The second he stopped talking, he knew he’d screwed up. Daniel’s face was as impassive as always, but his eyes… It was as if every word had been a slap.

“Fine,” the Dane said, calmly. “Understood.”

“Daniel, wait,” he tried to start, already feeling bad for what he'd just said. "I’m sor-“

Before he could finish, the door fell shut behind Dan and he was left alone. Now not only had he cocked it up with Stevie, but he’d managed to kick someone who had nothing to do with it right in the gut.

That week was moving gloriously to occupy the post of Worst Week Ever.

x-x-x

“What are we having?” 

Daniel pulled a chair and sat between Arbeloa and Dirk on the round table where the team was gathered at the diner. 

“Daniel!” Pepe greeted him enthusiastically. “Here, have a margarita.”

Dan’s face crumpled up. “What are you, toddlers? I thought Carra said we were having the good stuff tonight.”

“Carra suggested we had the boys’ stuff, but was outnumbered by the ladies,” Carragher explained, raising his glass of margarita in a sole toast. 

“Sissies,” the Dane muttered under his breath as he drank from the glass Pepe had just passed him.

“Where’s Finns?” Xabi asked, by ways of being polite, like Xabi always was. He couldn’t know Daniel was in no way interested in knowing the whereabouts of one Stephen Finnan (or so he told himself), or that it would send his well-practiced good mood downwards in a second.

“I don’t know,” he replied, flatly.

“Well, that’s a new one,” snorted Pepe.

Dan frowned at him. “What is that supposed to mean?”

The Spaniard shrugged. “That you two are always together?”

“We’re not!” The minute the protest left his lips, the Dane realized it sounded louder and bitterer than he’d intended to, which only raised eyebrows around the table. “I don’t know what Stephen does 24 hours a day,” he tried to fix it, gulping largely from his glass.

Out of the corner of his eyes, he caught Stevie watching him with intent, looking all fidgety as he tried to disguise his interest by hiding behind the rim of his glass. 

“What are you talking about, Dan? You and Finns are _always_ together,” Riise stated by matter of fact, receiving agreement nods from the others.

“I can’t remember ever seeing you here at the diner without him,” Sami added.

“In fact, you usually arrive together,” Carra pointed out.

Daniel was starting to feel cornered, as though he was being accused of something there. “It’s a coincidence.”

“It’s a coincidence you happen to come walking down the same pavement, coincidently side by side, and manage to walk through the door at the exact same second,” Dirk pointed out.

“Wow, Kuyt,” Pepe petted his friend on the back. “That was a very complex line of observation, my man. And it also made perfect sense. Congratulations.”

Dirk smiled. “Thank you very much, Pepe. But I can’t take all the credit. Danny and his Stephen didn’t really leave much for the imagination.”

“That is true, Dirky, they did not.”

“He’s not my Stephen,” Daniel cut them off. “And you guys talk like you don’t always come in together.”

“We do, all right. But we don’t freak out when other people point that out, or get angry just because someone asks us whether we have seen another member of our selective party.” It took Daniel a lot of self-possession right there not to send the tone of wisdom on Riise’s voice right back inside his ginger mouth. "So, what happened? Break up?"

"Fuck off, Ginger."

"Freaking out," Pepe pointed out.

“I am not freaking out!”

Xabi, who had managed to stay away from the debate so far, probably fearing he and Stevie would be brought into it at any given point, directed Daniel his best apologetic grin. “You kinda are, Dan.”

He huffed in annoyance and slumped back against his chair. “What is this shit now? Why are you all ganging up on me about Stephen?”

Pepe sighed deeply, exchanging meaningful glances with the other boys for a moment before turning his attention back to Daniel. All eyes on the table were on him. The creases between his eyes deepened further. “What is wrong with you lot? If I knew we’d have the fucking inquisition here tonight I wouldn’t have come.”

“Well, it’s good you have, Dan,” Pepe spoke. “You know in this team we have no secrets. It doesn’t matter how dirty or wrong or embarrassing it might be, we share everything.”

Daniel felt Stevie stirring in his own seat, eyes moving away from everyone on the table to stare at some conveniently interesting thing far away. But he seemed to be the only one noticing the restlessness on the captain, as all the others had their full attention trained on him, even Xabi.

“What is this about?”

“This, my friend, is about the fact that we, as a group, think that you and Finns have been hiding things from us.”

“Why don’t I like the sound of this conversation?”

“Daniel, answer straight.” Pepe’s hand fell with a thud on the table, making everyone flinch slightly. “Are you or are you not banging Finns?”

Daniel’s eyes shot wide. “What?!”

“ _Banging_ , Pepe? Seriously?” Riise shook his head.

“What, you wanted me to ask if he’s been making _love_ to Finns?”

“What?! No-!”

“Couldn’t you just ask if he’s been seeing Finns?”

“Oh, hey, shut it right there!” This time Daniel was the one to smack his hand down on the table. It was starting to get annoying to have them talking about him as though he wasn’t there. “Where the fuck did that stupid idea come from?”

Riise shrugged. “Stevie and Xabi started out like that too.”

Daniel let out a humorless laughter. “You’re comparing Finns and me to Stevie and Xabi, seriously?”

“So you’re saying you’re not banging him?”

“Yes, Arbeloa, that’s what I’m saying.”

“Is he banging you then?”

Daniel puffed. “Like that’s ever gonna happen.”

“Is that supposed to say you’re firmly against the idea of being a bottom?” Luis Garcia, who had been quiet during the whole inquiry session, merely smiling on his corner, asked. 

It got eye-rolls from most of the table, but Daniel grinned. “Why, would you care to find out?”

Luis smirked back at him, but Pepe waved his arms in the air and cut them off. “You can stop the flirting, thank you very much! This is not the time.”

“You started the banging subject, Pepe,” Daniel pointed out.

“And the purpose was merely to clarify an honest doubt, not to have you two making eyes at each other.”

Daniel and Luis exchanged grins, but the Dane decided to leave it for the time being. “Your answer is still no, Pepe.”

“Are you sure?”

“Well, let me think.” He drank again. “Oh, sorry, just remembered, I did bang Stephen today. Fucked him so hard I left him boneless and daydreaming in his bed. That’s why he’s not here.”

Pepe narrowed his eyes at him. “You joke, Agger, but I have a sixth sense for that kind of thing. I have a friend back in Spain, freckled just like you, who tried to lie to me about the guy he was seeing.” He shook his head slowly for a measure of drama. “Didn’t last a week.”

“Well, maybe you should introduce me to your freckled friend, then.” He winked at Pepe, but grinned at Luis again. “Are we done here? Because if you’re going to have another go, I think I’m gonna have to ask for something stronger. This is really boring.”

“Oh, I know! Let’s have a drinking game!” Dirk suggested with enthusiasm.

“For fuck’s sake,” Carra said. “This always turns into an excuse for gay sex jokes.”

“I like gay sex,” Daniel paused deliberately, “jokes.”

“See what I mean?” 

“Why can’t we just have a quiet round of margaritas?” Stevie interjected for the first time since Dan’s arrival. 

“Shut it, scousers,” Arbeloa said. “Carra, get your friend to send the boys’ stuff over. This will be an epic drinking game.”

x-x-x

It was nowhere near epic.

Daniel had a wonderful feeling about Arbeloa’s Truth or Dare. They’d probably ask him questions about Finns, but he was ready not to be too distressed about it. The important thing was that both he and Luis would be getting knackered, and how the hell had he never noticed Luis Garcia before?

Two gay sex jokes and not nearly enough alcohol later and Carra decided to break it off, and that was the end of his brilliant prospect.

The Dane stepped outside to have a cigarette. He was quietly leaning against the wall, watching the slow movement of downtown Liverpool in an ordinary Tuesday night. The sounds of glasses clicking and laughter and the occasional scouse bark, mostly coming from Carra, were shut inside. Daniel breathed in the night air, let it out along with the smoke, allowing himself a few minutes of honest peace, something rare in the last week or so, when the steadiness was interrupted by the sound of the door cracking open behind him.

He spared a second to wonder whether he was still in the mood for ravishing Spaniards. But instead of a dashing brunette, Dan got a Liverpool product with permanent worry creases on his forehead. 

Steven Gerrard came to a casual halt beside him, hands stuffed in his jacket’s pockets, eyes positively avoiding direct contact with his. 

“Hey,” Stevie finally said after a spell of uncertainty.

“Hey,” Daniel replied. They fell into an awkward silence; Daniel could almost hear Stevie’s heart beating against his rib cage. He sighed. This was going to be about Stephen, wasn’t it? “What is it, Stevie?”

Stevie’s mouth opened and closed twice before he managed to get the words out. Daniel gave himself a second to appreciate the clear uneasiness on his colleague. It wasn’t every day that you got to see Captain Fantastic at a loss for words. “I have a question,” the Scouser blurted out. “I know you already answered, but maybe you just weren’t willing to share your private life with everyone else.”

“And what makes you think I would be willing to share it with you?”

Stevie bit his lower lip, a little shocked by the lack of warmth on his voice. It had been a tad mean, he had to admit. But then again, he didn’t get to have Gerrard tiptoeing around him very often. And there was also the fact that he was feeling gratuitously hostile towards the captain these days as well.

“You want to ask me whether I’m seeing Stephen or not.” It wasn’t a question. Stevie nodded. “Because you’re wondering the odds of me getting really pissed at the fact you’ve been snogging him.”

It was hard not laughing when Stevie’s eyes bulged out. He didn’t seem to know whether he wanted to dig a hole and hide, run away or just get angry. Once the terror had been reigned in, Stevie just shook his head in resignation. “He told you?”

“No, in Denmark we’re taught from a very young age how to read minds. The guilty ones in special.” 

“I don’t know what happened!” Stevie said, gesticulating frantically. “I was angry at Xabi, and then we were talking, and it was nice and cool and I was having a good time, and then he kissed me, and I kissed him back, and we were-“

“Hey, hey, hey,” Daniel stopped him. “You don’t owe me explanations, mate.”

“So you’re not sleeping with him?”

“If I was, you’d have a black eye already.”

Stevie narrowed his eyes at him, but decided to let it go. “Promise you won’t tell Xabi.”

“You and Xabi are not my problem.”

“Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me.”

Dan studied him for a spell. Stevie didn’t seem happy at all, but he was relieved. It made him think about Finns and how he’d become a complete stranger to everyone ever since that damned snogging session. Finns was rarely ever seen hanging out with the lads lately, while Stevie, albeit bothered, was still there, with his beautiful boyfriend and his friends. It just didn’t seem fair that only one of them had to submit himself to penitence for something _both_ of them did.

“Tell me something,” Dan said, throwing out his cigarette. “Are you into Stephen?”

Stevie was slightly taken aback by the question. He blinked. “What?”

“It’s a simple question. Are you into him?”

“No!” He swallowed. “I mean, I like Finns, he’s a fine lad, but… I love Xabi.”

Of course he loved Xabi. He wore it as bright as daylight written all over his face. There was a side of Daniel feeling oddly relieved to hear confirmation, but the other side was still resentful. 

“Then you have to fix this,” he said in his best authoritative voice.

“Fix it how?”

“You have to go talk to Finns and get over this shit. He’s been acting like a douche since you two lost your fucking minds. I’ve tried to reason with him, it didn’t work. You did this, you fix it.”

“You don’t think I’ve tried? He doesn’t answer my calls, doesn’t show up to hang out, no one ever sees him outside class in school and it’s practically impossible to even come near him during trainings.”

“Clearly, since he’s avoiding you. I don’t care what you do, just talk to him.”

“Are you suggesting I tackle him, pin him to the ground and make him talk?”

“Yeah, because that would send the right message.”

Stevie sighed. “That’s so screwed up… I don’t know what to do. And then there’s Xabi… I was so angry at him, but now I feel terrible.”

“Yeah, whatever. Just deal with this. I’m almost punching Finns back into normalcy and I don’t think that’s gonna get me lots of points with him, so you better give me my friend back before I lose it.”

That, right there, was what Stephen would’ve described as completely unnecessary bollocks. Daniel could almost hear the sound of his ‘tsk’. Stevie had screwed up, yes, but he was vulnerable, didn’t know what to do. He was also just a teenager who had given in to anger and hormones and snogged a perfectly attractive, perfectly willing guy against his better judgment. Daniel couldn’t even remember how many times he’d done stupid things out of spite. That conversation, for example. He was using Stevie’s troubled head to guilt him further, and of course he knew that was mean and heartless, not to mention completely hypocritical of him. His temper was always engaged on a never-ending battle against reason and good sense – and winning it nine out of ten times. 

There was only one person in that country who could actually have him behave, even if just barely, and said person was currently unavailable because of Stevie, and if he was also maybe a little bit jealous, who could blame him? It was perfectly normal. Right?

“I’ll see you inside,” Daniel said, leaving Stevie on the pavement to mull things over by himself. He definitely needed a drink now.

x-x-x

Finns blasted through his bedroom door like a force of nature.

“You are unbelievable!” his best mate chided, shutting the door closed behind him with fury. 

Daniel just looked at him, deadpanned. “Am I supposed to know what this is about?”

“This is about you meddling in my business! I told you to stay out of it but you couldn’t keep your mouth shut, could you?!” When Daniel showed no signs of comprehension, Finns exhaled impatiently. “Stevie.”

 _Of course_.

Daniel shook his head and leaned back against his chair. “Pardon me. I forgot it’s always something about Stevie these days.”

“Why did you go talk to him, Daniel? You had no right!”

“Stop right there.” Dan suppressed a hitch of irritation and tried to keep his cool, but this whole Stevie debacle was getting old and he was getting pretty sick of it. “I didn’t go after Stevie, he came after me.”

“What do you mean he came after you?”

“What part of that you didn’t understand?” His voice was restrained, but he wasn’t trying to disguise the harshness of his tone.

Finns clearly bit back the beginning of a burst of rage. “Why would he go after you? He barely talks to you.”

“Because he wanted to know whether he should be worried you two had cheated on more than one person with your cuteness.” Finns frowned, clueless. “He wanted to know if we’re together.”

“What?! Why would he think that?”

Daniel shrugged. “You should ask Prince Charming. I haven’t got a bloody clue.”

Finns sighed, scratched his head and sat on Dan’s bed, looking down at the space between his shoes.

Daniel rolled his eyes. He was sick of getting the accusatory pointed fingers all the time, but someone had to be the better person here, or they’d be forever engaged on this stupid and endless quarrel. He wasn’t used to being the mature one in any relationship, but there was a first time for everything in life, wasn’t there?

“So I take it you two finally talked,” he said, picking up conversation. “How was it?”

Finns shrugged wearily. “Fine, I guess.”

“You’re gonna have to be more specific.”

“We’re ok. I think. I don’t know. It’s still awkward but I think we left this behind us now.”

“Good,” Daniel nodded. “It was about time.”

Stephen dredged up a laugh. “You’re so judgmental, aren’t you? Thinking I’m some retarded cheerleader shaking my tail at the quarterback.”

“Let’s not make any references to American sports here, please.” He paused. “And I did not say you’re retarded.”

“But it’s what you think.”

“I used to think you understood me, but lately it really seems like you haven’t got a fucking clue of what I’m thinking.”

“You’re the one who doesn’t understand.”

“What don’t I understand, Stephen?” Daniel crossed his arms over his chest and kept his eyes trained on his friend. “Explain to me.”

“I’m not like you. Or Stevie. In case you haven’t noticed, I’m not one of the most popular lads around this place.”

“Is this going to be about self-pity? Because I’m not taking this bullshit.”

“It’s not bullshit, Daniel, and it’s not self-pity either!” Finns cried out with exasperation. “I’m many things, but I’m not daft. I understand what happened between me and Stevie. I understood it ten minutes after I left. I’m the world’s best fucking moron in figuring things out once they’ve happened! It’s the damn present I can’t deal with.” He stopped, searching for his words as his eyes wandered about Daniel’s room. “I just wanted to believe for five seconds that for once in my life someone I was into was actually feeling something back for me. You don’t get that. For people like you and Stevie that’s everyday talk, you just have to snap your fingers. You walk around flaunting your tattoos and your stupid Mohawk –“

“Hey! It’s not stupid!” Daniel lifted a hand to touch his hair defensively.

“It is stupid! And you show it off like it’s some sort of come-hither card, and for reasons that go way beyond my comprehension, that works! Pepe told me about Luis Garcia, by the way.” If Daniel didn’t know better, he’d think there was a tiny bit of jealousy sprinkled over that last bit. 

“I don’t think anything is easy, Stephen, I just don’t feel sorry for myself or worry about people thinking my hair looks stupid – which it doesn’t, by the way. The word for it is cool.” He caressed the top of his head. “So what if Stevie-fucking-Gerrard doesn’t like you? He’s not good enough for you anyway! You can do much better, Finns. So stop eating your heart out!” There was another pause. “What did Pepe say about Luis?”

Finns directed him a pointed look, one that said he’d be ignoring that question for Dan’s own good.

Daniel gave him an eye roll and moved over to sit next to him on the bed. “Finns, just listen to me, ok? You’re an attractive guy, you’re smart, you’re funny and you’re the nicest person in this bloody city ever since I moved here.”

“You’re just saying that.”

“I have no reason to be appeasing you right now. You were a fucking asshole to me, I should be hating you.”

Finns pursued his lips and looked at him with nothing but remorse. Daniel almost felt sorry for him, but not quite. He wasn’t easily hurt, but Finns had managed get his finger on the raw with flying colors. “I hope you know I didn’t mean those things. I was angry.”

“You shouldn’t have said them anyway.”

“I’m sorry, Dan.”

“I was expecting that would be the first thing you’d say once you gathered the courage to face me again. In fact, I'm disappointed it took you so long to come to me.”

Stephen sighed. “I’ve been… confused.”

“I know.”

“So you forgive me?” Finns asked, hopeful.

“I didn’t say that.” 

The look of utter desolation on Stephen’s face didn’t feel all that bad. Didn’t feel bad at all, actually. Daniel was a little vengeful.

“Yeah, whatever. I’m a great human being.”

Finns smiled shortly. “I appreciate it.”

“You better. I don’t usually hand out forgiveness that easily.”

“Being favored here, am I?”

“You’re lucky I like you.” 

There was a heartbeat’s pause, during which they both seemed to measure the words and consider possibilities that hadn’t been open before.

“I really like you,” Dan forged on, giving a different kind of intonation to his voice.

Finns blinked. “I like you too,” he said.

“No,” Dan shook his head slightly. “That’s not what I meant.”

“What did you mean?” Stephen asked with creases scribbled on his forehead.

“I mean that you’re there complaining that no one bothers giving you a second glance and, well… I did.”

“Dan…” Finns started, shifting uncomfortably in his place. 

“It’s no big deal, Finns. Don’t go getting weird on me again.”

“I -” he shut his mouth, opened again, tried to speak and gave up. 

Daniel sighed. “Too late, huh?”

“Too late?” Finns blinked. “What- No. It’s not… I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Finns babbled, tripping over his lines. “I gotta go.”

“Finns, wait,” Daniel said, standing up as his friend went to the door. “Come on, don’t be like that. I already said I didn’t mean anything, it was just… Whatever, doesn’t matter. I take it back. Let’s quit the stupid fighting.”

“We’re not fighting.”

“Then why are you leaving?”

“I…” he trailed off again. “I just have to go.”

That, right there, was why Daniel Agger didn’t do relationships. And it was stubbornly escaping his mind the moment he’d gotten himself in one without ever asking for it. Worse: without even getting the pros of being in a relationship. 

The arguments, the fighting, the weirdness, the jealousy. Those were all the _relationship_ things he spent his entire puberty running away from like the devil hiding from the cross, and yet here he was. Alone in his room, feeling oddly like he had had yet another break up; the fifth just this month.

Usually, he’d just give up and go find something else to occupy his time with. But this was no usual clingy one night stand, was it? This was the one person he actually liked spending time with in this city, the only one who could put up with his crap. The only one who had bothered being kind to him when no one else felt inclined to it.

Dan lied down on his bed and covered his own face with a pillow, groaning loudly in frustration. If he never had to deal with people ever again in his life it would be too soon.

x-x-x-x-x

He was the last one in the showers after practice when Daniel walked in.

Their relationship, whatever it was, was getting way over the border of confusing lately. It was hard to keep up: they weren’t speaking, then they were, then they weren’t again, then it was awkward but they kind of were on speaking terms, although neither of them seemed to know exactly what to say, which made them technically, however non-officially, not speaking again. It was like trying to fine tune an old radio; a little too much to the right or to the left and all you got was noise.

Daniel looked at him as he walked by as though he was about to say something but didn’t really know what, so gave up and moved along instead. It was great that they were both really good with their words. Finns suspected half their issues wouldn’t be issues at all if they were.

The Dane stopped at a stall a little ahead, but not far enough that Finns couldn’t see him. He had a sense of self-consciousness there he’d never had before. There was something more than a little disconcerting about being undressed in front of Dan all of a sudden, even though it’d happened countless times before. Suddenly he was very aware that Daniel was stark naked, and that he was even _nakeder_ , if that was possible, and that they were both in the same room, just a few meters away from each other, and it was making every single hair on his body bristle.

Daniel had his back turned to him, his head under the shower as the water cascaded down his tattoos. Deep down Stephen knew he shouldn’t be staring, but he couldn’t help it. It set a fresh batch of butterflies loose in his stomach and he felt weird in a brand new fashion, one he couldn’t quite put his finger on.

When Dan turned, he immediately looked away, pretending to be washing himself in a totally unconvincing manner, embarrassed to be caught studying the other boy. But when he glanced back, Daniel was still looking. Under usual circumstances, Daniel would smirk, make some lewd comment and suggest sex somehow. But there wasn’t a single drop of debauchery on him. In ways, it made everything a lot more uncomfortable.

Finns knew how to deal with smart-ass Daniel. Smart-ass Daniel was fine, easy. Serious, no non-sense Daniel, on the other hand, was completely new territory.

Along with the guilt of having improper thoughts, Stephen also felt his heart drop a little bit. It seemed like he couldn’t really get anything right these days. He stuck his head under the cold water and stood very still, until he couldn’t hear his own thoughts anymore.

He finished his shower first, wrapped the towel around himself and walked out to get changed. He was drying up his hair and back before putting on his shirt when Daniel came out.

“Stephen,” he said before Finns could hurry up and run away. He was getting rather good at that.

Dan stopped in front of him, shielding Finns and their conversation from the lads chatting away on the other side of the room. “I’m sorry,” he started. “I take it all back. It was a mistake to kiss you, it was a mistake to tell you I’m into you, I know that now. I shouldn’t have said anything and I’m sorry. I’ll never bring this up ever again. I just want you to know that it really, _really_ didn’t mean anything, I wasn’t looking forward to anything, it was just… Whatever. It doesn’t matter. Let’s just put this behind us and move on, because I’m sick of fighting all the time and I kind of miss my best friend.”

It was a long speech, very unlike Daniel, probably something he’d rehearsed many times before blurting it all out. In a way, it was flattering that he went through the trouble of practicing his apology. Too bad Finns stopped listening mid-way.

“Dan,” Finns said. “When did you kiss me?”

He shut out the rest of whatever it was Daniel said when he heard ‘It was a mistake to kiss you’ and started wondering when in God’s name had they kissed? He narrowed his eyes, furrowed his brow and thought really hard, but he couldn’t remember. And it didn’t sound like something he’d forget. It sounded good by means of apology, but it just didn't make any sense. Why would someone apologize for something they didn't do?

Finns was half hoping Daniel had messed up his lines, but the terror spread on his face, as though he had just realized what he said, kind of gave it away that he hadn't.

“I didn’t say that,” Daniel tried to deny anyway.

“Yes, you did. You said kissing me was a mistake. When did we kiss?”

The boy bit his lip and scratched the back of his head, glancing away for a moment. “The night you were drunk,” he admitted. “When I dropped you off at your place.”

Finns gaped. “But I thought you were joking!” It came out a little louder than he meant, attracting the attention from the other boys. “You said it was a joke,” he repeated, pitching his voice low.

“I was! It was just a kiss, nothing more.”

“And you didn’t think about bringing it up?!”

“What for?” Dan asked with a contrite slump on his shoulders. “I merely suggested it and you were all weird. It would’ve stolen away out last few moments of peace.”

Finns' mouth snapped shut as he swallowed back several replies that weren't remotely up to the level of discomfort the situation was provoking in him.

“Anyway, I’m sorry about that too. But it was nothing, I swear.” With a weary sigh, Daniel walked to his locker. Finns finished dressing, his mind reeling as he tried to recover anything from that night. How was he supposed to believe that _'just a kiss'_ was all that happened now? Clearly there was more to that night than Daniel was letting him know.

But, interestingly enough, that wasn't the most pressing thing going through his mind. Finns knew he ought to be concerned about more important issues, but there was a seemingly irrelevant question hammering at the back of his head, calling for attention.

“Dan,” he approached his friend and lowered his voice. “Did I kiss you back?”

Daniel blinked. “Does it matter?”

 _No_ , he wanted to say. But, for whatever reason, he just had to know. Somehow it made a difference.

“Yes.”

Dan nodded his head slowly in confirmation.

“Thank you.”

Stephen picked up his bag and left the room.

 

x-x-x

“Hello, Steve!”

Finns was calmly going through his stuff in the changing room when something invaded his personal space. Something big, ravishing and Australian. And also the only person to call him _Steve_ other than his uncle Kieran back in Ireland.

Harry Kewell was the personification of charm beaming at him, leaning against the locker next to his, a little too close for comfort.

“Hi, Harry,” he replied, suspiciously. “Can I help you?”

“Bear with me for just a moment, ok?” The Australian winked, and took one step closer to him.

“O…k. Is it necessary to be this close though?”

“Does it bother you?”

“Maybe?”

Harry laughed. “Officially, I’m here to give you this.” He pushed a little white envelope against Finns' chest, touching his naked skin for a lot longer than it was required.

It took long seconds after he’d taken the envelope for Harry to remove his hand.

“It’s an invitation for Sheree Murphy’s party. Next Friday.”

“Oh. That time of the year already.”

“Yup. And, as always, I expect you to be there or I’ll have to start avoiding you.”

“Like we’re always hanging out.”

Harry feigned a hurt look. “Ouch. That was mean _and_ completely uncalled for.”

"Like your hand on my chest."

The Australian grinned again. He was rejoicing in this. "I'm sorry, force of habit. I see something nice, I wanna touch it."

“What’s with the hand and the touching, Harry?”

"Why? Didn't you appreciate it?”

Finns cocked him an eyebrow. Harry was rarely ever seen at the training area nowadays, especially when both Stevie and Xabi were in the premises. The Spaniard was, Stephen noticed, the only one looking at their weird interaction, albeit trying to disguise his glances and making a horrible job at it. The other ones were all purposively ignoring it. There was something strange in the air…

“Harry,” Finns demanded.

The Australian sighed, rolled his eyes. “The guys seem to think there’s something going on between you and Danny boy over there. So they asked me to pop in and help them confirm their suspicions.”

“Oh?!”

“Yeah. So just bear with me here, will you? It won't take long now.”

Finns peered over Harry's shoulder in search for Daniel and found him completely oblivious to the Australian’s advance, putting a Band-Aid on a freshly acquired wound on his knee.

“Well, I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I don’t think your experiment is going to be very successful. There’s nothing between us.”

“Really?” Harry seemed genuinely surprised. “Because I put money on it.”

Finns frowned. Why would Harry have an opinion on something he wasn't even aware of? Or... Were they being that obvious? “What do you know?”

Harry shrugged, lifted a hand to comb his fingers gently through Finns’ wet hair. “Not much. But I imagined Danny would’ve made a move already by now.”

“What do you mean ‘by now’?” Finns was so interested in what Harry had to say he didn’t even flinch when the other boy's fingertips brushed lightly against his face. Harry smiled.

“Since the club, of course.”

“What clu-” He stopped mid-sentence. “You were at that club too?”

Harry snorted. “Darling, was I there? Don’t tell me you don’t remember.”

Finns groaned in annoyance. “Are you gonna tell me you kissed me too?”

Harry’s eyebrows shot up immediately. “ _Too_? Does that mean Daniel did make a move on you?”

“It wasn’t a move, it was just… I don’t know, I don’t remember. It was nothing. He just mentioned it.”

“You don’t remember meeting me at the club?”

“I don’t remember anything from that night.”

“Damn!” Harry shook his head. “You were absolutely hot that night, Finns. With all due respect.”

Finns’ eyes flickered away from Harry, to Pepe and Arbeloa gossiping on the other side, then back again. He could almost feel his cheeks burning.

“Don’t look so embarrassed,” Harry said, a fun smile on his face. He had a thing for making people uncomfortable under his gaze, Finns was aware. It was always like he was undressing the person he was talking to, except instead of looking like a horny bastard while doing so, Harry always managed to come out as impossibly irresistible. What was it with those Australians? “You were amazing, Finns. I would’ve made a move, but your body guard over there was threatening to murder me in cold blood. So I left you to your business.” A lewd smirk spread on his lips. “Glad to know he didn’t let me down.”

“Well, I don’t know what you’re talking about, all I know is I don’t remember anything and there’s nothing going on.” At that exact moment, he noticed Daniel getting up, taking his bag, waving goodbye to the lads and quietly taking off. Harry’s inappropriate proximity didn’t bother him at all. Finns disguised that little bubble of disappointment and turned back to his classmate. “And to prove my point, he just left.”

“What?!” Harry turned around, taking a few steps back and confirming Daniel’s absence. “Oh, damn it!”

“Harry!” Pepe bellowed, approaching them and slapping his former teammate on the arm. “You ruined it! You were supposed to be good at flirting!”

"I told you we should've asked Stevie," Riise added, shaking his head.

“Hey, don’t blame me! I was good! Wasn’t I, Finns?”

Finns just sighed, put on his shirt and threw his bag over his shoulder. “You know, you lot could’ve just asked and I would’ve told you there’s nothing going on. Think about it next time. Now if you’ll excuse me.”

He left Pepe, Riise, Dirk and Arbeloa discussing flirt tactics with Harry and walked out. A part of him thought that maybe he should've looked more offended or said something deep in reprehension to make them feel bad about their little plot. But he wasn't in the mood for that. If anything, he was sharing their disappointment, which was disturbing enough in itself.

Just as he was passing by the parking lot, going towards the bus stop, he heard, “So, are you going to that whoever’s party with Harry?”

Finns turned to find Daniel leaning against a car, cigarette in one hand, watching him.

“What are you doing there?”

The Dane motioned vaguely in the air with the hand he was holding the cigarette, before taking a drag. “So, are you?”

Finns approached him, stopping a few safe steps away. This was their first conversation in days. “Why would I?”

“Wasn’t he asking to be your date to the party just now? He seemed pretty intense.”

“So you noticed us.”

“Everyone did, Finns.”

“I’m not going to the party with Harry.”

Dan nodded his head slowly, taking another long drag. “Because Harry has a thing for you, you know.”

“You mean what happened at the club?”

Dan looked surprised for a second. “You remember now?”

“No, but he mentioned it. Why did you never tell me we met Harry there?”

Dan shrugged. “Why would I?”

“I don’t know, seems relevant.”

“Is it relevant to you that we ran into Harry at a club?”

“Sure. I mean… Meeting someone you know is always relevant.”

“Well, I had no idea Harry Kewell was relevant to you.”

“He’s not. I’m just saying.”

“He tried to hit on you.”

Finns scratched his head. “He mentioned that too.” This was the part where Stephen should ask if by saying ‘tried’ Daniel meant that he’d stopped him – _and why did you?_ Instead, he just said, “You never really told me anything about that night. I mean, the only thing I know was… Well… _That_. And you didn’t even mean to tell me, it just slipped out.”

“There are no more dirty secrets, if that's what you mean."

"It's not." Although it was, a little bit. Just a couple of weeks before, Finns would've been relieved. Now, though, he was not so sure. "Harry made it sound like I was having a good time." _Amongst other things_ , he thought. "It just made me realize I have no idea."

"You had fun that night. You said so yourself. And then you thanked me for taking you out.”

Stephen smiled timidly. “Too bad I didn’t get to remember.”

“Yeah… You spent most of the night dancing,” Daniel added with a lopsided grin.

Stephen looked disconcerted. “Dancing?”

“Yup. With two girls.”

“Two girls?!”

“One rubbing against your front, the other on your back. Both very upset that you took neither of them home at the end of the night. You could’ve easily scored a ménage there.”

“What?!” Daniel laughed as Finns looked outraged. “That doesn’t sound like me at all!”

“Maybe not like sober you. The booze always gets the best out of us.”

"I think I've had better moments."

"That's debatable."

"God." Finns shook his head, trying and failing to imagine himself dancing his life away with two people at the same time. “Now I’m embarrassed.”

“Embarrassed? Finns, you looked… Hot.”

“Whoring my way through the dance floor.”

“Still hot.”

“You were right, I think I’d rather not know that.”

“A wise man once said it’s better to go through life in shame than in oblivion.”

“It doesn't sound wise at all. Who said that?”

“Daniel Agger. Give due credit when passing it on.”

Finns laughed shortly and watched as Dan took one last drag of his smoke before tossing it out on the bushes next to them.

“You’re gonna burn this school down one day,” he said, like he always did. Daniel ignored him, also per usual, and then he smiled; Finns tried to keep his serious, reproving look on, but failed miserably. It felt good having a little bit of their normal selves there, even if just for two seconds, and even if it meant starting a fire at school.

“Anything else you’d like to know?” Daniel asked.

“I’m good.” He paused. “But, uhm… Just so you know, Harry wasn’t hitting on me. The guys asked him to pretend to hit on me ‘cause they thought it would unleash the green eyed monster in you, thus proving their theory."

"I'm surprised those thick-minded bastards even managed to come up with a theory."

"Shocking, I know."

"Should I be honored to be unconsciously indulging that kind of thing?"

"That depends on what you think of their theory, I guess."

"What are they theorizing about?"

"They think we are… Involved, somehow.”

Daniel didn’t even look surprised. “No shit.”

“Shit. They’re having a go at Harry for failing at empirical demonstration right now.”

“But I did think he was asking you out. Doesn't that count?”

“No. Because you didn’t care.” Finns grinned wanly. For a heartbeat there, it looked like Dan was going to say something, but he remained quiet.

“Well,” he continued. “I have to go. Are you… going to Sheree’s party?”

“Are you?”

“Harry always makes everyone go. Something about refusing to have uncool friends or something. I guess I’ll be there. You?”

“I don’t know.”

Finns just nodded. “Ok,” he said, and grinned sheepishly at his friend. “See you, Dan.”

And he walked away.

x-x-x

Sheree Murphy’s party was one of the most awaited events of the school year, second only to Alex Curran’s totally exclusive birthday celebration. Stevie was the only one who ever got invited to hers, but Sheree had a thing for the football team in general, rather than just the captain. And an even bigger thing for Harry Kewell, who made sure they all got invited every year.

Despite finding out he was apparently a party monster, Stephen wasn't really in touch with his bouncy side lately. He considered living with Harry's disdainful glares for a while, but what the heck, right? It wasn't like he had anything better to do or was popular enough around school to skip an event like that. Harry was kinda right. Which meant, in the end, the team was all there.

All but one.

Finns kept letting his eyes wander around the party in search of a certain Danish bloke, but hadn’t been able to locate him so far.

“I saw him earlier, a little before you arrived,” Pepe informed him when he decided it was an innocent enough question to be made without lifting any eyebrows. “Call him.”

 _You say it like it’s easy_ , Finns thought. It was anything but. They hadn’t talked since the last training session, days before. He had no idea whether Daniel would even be there. And to be honest, he wasn't even sure why he wanted him to be. What was he going to say? _Oh, I just wanted to spend some quality time not talking and being awkward around you._

Things had been so twisted between the two of them lately Finns would rather not even think anymore. He got lost somewhere along the road and missed the point where they’d gone from being good friends to not being able to stay in each other’s presence without screwing something up. He remembered the kind of strained silences that seemed to fill every single interaction he had with Daniel nowadays from when he asked his first girl out, in sixth grade, and spent the entire movie session sweating and emphatically not looking at her. It was hard taking a girl out when you had no clue what to do and didn't even find the idea of snogging her all that appealing anyway. There was so much pressure... He remembered only too vividly feeling as though he was getting ready to murder a baby panda. It was horrible.

The girl ended up kissing him anyway. The kiss was fine, it was the part where she was a girl he came to realize he had a problem or two with.

It wasn't exactly like killing tiny pandas with Daniel. Only maybe like there was a really big one strangling him whenever his friend was around, leaving him breathless and wordless and probably a little bit dead as well every time they walked away with some brand new fucked up reason to feel weird.

Regardless of all that, he missed Daniel. More than he ever thought he would.

Hours and a few beers into the party, Finns excused himself to find a bathroom. Sheree’s house was as big as his own, if not bigger. It was very good not being the only stupidly rich kid around. He went up to the second floor, the off-limits rule long broken by the already inebriated guests.

The first and second doors were locked. The third one was a closet. The fourth room was being occupied by a bunch of people doing things Finns preferred not to take his time understanding. And then there was the fifth door.

It was like walking right into a porn movie. Luis Garcia was sitting on a bed, eyes shut, head bent back, lips parted with Spanish gibberish coming out as he petted the head of the individual kneeling between his legs.

“Oh my God,” Finns said, momentarily paralyzed. “I-I’m-Sorry. I’m sorry, I was looking for a… You don’t want to know. Oh bollocks. I’m sorry!” he stuttered, staring at some blank point on the wall behind Luis as he spoke.

“Finns?”

He had no idea a heart could sink as fast as his went right there.

“Daniel,” he said, as the boy between Luis’ legs turned around to face him. His lips were red and swollen and he had spit around his mouth. His eyes were literally glowing. He looked… Vivid. Satisfied. Beautiful. Like he did on the pitch, during a very good match. Only this was most definitely not a match.

Finns buried the surge of irrational jealousy that threatened to surface, keeping his voice steady as to not betray the fact. “God, I’m sorry. I’m going. I’m really sorry.”

He turned around and shut the door, cringing inwardly.

His sixth grade horror movie session suddenly didn't feel that bad anymore.

Completely forgetting he wanted to find a bathroom, Finns flew down the stairs, three steps at a time, and fled the party.

x-x-x

He had been forcing himself to sleep to no avail for almost two hours, rolling around the bedsheets thinking about pandas dying horrible deaths, when he heard it.

It was sudden and short and loud and it sounded like it had come from outside. Finns lifted his head from the pillow, startled, and looked at the window. There was nothing abnormal about it. He blinked, waited for something to happen but heard nothing but the night falling into quietness again.

He rested his head back against the pillow, and then it happened again. This time he saw it: something small and black hitting the glass. He stood up and walked to the window. Just as he lifted it open, another rock came flying into his direction, missing him by inches and landing somewhere in his room.

Annoyed, he stuck his head out and saw Daniel Agger preparing for another throw.

“What the fuck are you doing, Daniel?!” he chided, trying to keep his voice as low as possible. “It’s four in the fucking morning, go away!”

“No!” Dan replied with unyielding determination. “You’re gonna have to come down or let me in!”

“Go away!”

“I’ll just keep throwing rocks until you can’t ignore me!”

“Shhhh!” he gesticulated with his hands for him to keep it down. “Are you insane?! My parents are going to wake up and call the coppers!”

“I'd hurry up if I were you then!”

Fuming, Stephen finally agreed. “Go to the front door and be quiet!”

Daniel’s complete disregard for acceptable social conduct could drive him nuts sometimes, and it was just impossible to try and argue with him. He’d just go ahead and do whatever he wanted. One could do no more than bear with him and hope not to get caught.

Finns padded down the stairs, looked around to check that there was no one up, and hurried to the door. The reek of cigars invaded his nostrils like he’d just walked into a smoke cloud the moment he opened it. The older boy took a step back and made a grimace. “Jesus, were you planning on smoking yourself?”

“I had a lot of cigarettes tonight,” Daniel admitted.

The moment their eyes met, awkwardness fell upon them like a grey fog. This was definitely not going to be good.

“Finns-“

“Shhh, not here. Someone could hear us.” He made room for Daniel to get in and then led the way up to his room, softly closing the door and taking perhaps a second too long with his hands on the doorknob before turning around to face his friend.

Daniel looked antsy, nervous; his hair was tousled and messed in a funny way – _courtesy of Luis Garcia_ , Stephen thought with a sting of bitterness.

“What do you want?” he asked instead.

Agger sucked the air in and let it out with his answer. “I don’t know.”

“You throw rocks at my window at four in the morning and you don’t know what you want?”

“It would’ve been easier if you had just answered your phone.”

“Battery died.” It wasn't true. He had deliberately turned the phone off. It didn't seem like it had been that much of a good idea now.

“Right.” Daniel fell silent for a moment. “Look, do you want to talk about it?”

“Talk about what?”

“You know what,” Daniel paused. “Luis.”

Finns made a scene of rolling his eyes. “Right, Luis. Shouldn’t you be with him now?” He walked past Daniel to shut down the window. 

“No,” Daniel said, simply. “I tried to find you, you know.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know, it just felt like the right thing to do. You seemed… uncomfortable.”

“Of course I was uncomfortable,” he said, a little too huffy. “I was looking for a bathroom but found you pleasuring Luis Garcia instead. Bloody hell, Daniel. Anyone could've walked in on you.”

“It just happened. I wanted to chase you down right away but –“

“You don’t owe me explanations. You’re allowed to suck whoever you want, even if it’s highly inappropriate.”

“Finns,” Daniel took a step closer to him. “Are you really not bothered?”

“Why would I be bothered?!”

“I don’t know, that’s why I’m asking.”

“I’m not bothered.” His words were more like a command to himself than a proper answer to Daniel. _Be not bothered, be not bothered!_ As the other boy spoke of his adventures with their Spanish striker, all he wanted was to scream for him to shut up. It was bad enough he had to witness the act, he didn’t want to hear about it too. “I’m not!” he repeated, as Daniel looked as unconvinced as his own head. “I’m not bothered, Daniel, I already told you. Why would I care that you were snogging Luis? Just because I spent the entire fucking night looking for you at that stupid party?” And there it was. “I don’t care.”

Daniel sighed. “I can’t do this anymore.”

“Do what?”

“This,” Dan motioned his hands between the two of them. “You getting weird at me all the time, us bickering every single thing. I’m tired.”

“What are you saying? Are you… quitting –“ _us, me_ , “ – our friendship?”

“What I’m saying, Stephen, is that there is a huge, fat elephant sitting between the two of us at all times and it’s getting bloody exhausting pretending it isn’t there, not to mention it is clearly not working anyway.”

The creases on his brow deepened further. “What elephant?”

Daniel pressed his lips tightly together, as though bracing himself for something, and then walked the steps separating the two of them. He smelled of cigarettes and cologne, whether it was his or Luis’ Finns couldn’t tell.

“Stephen,” Dan started, in a low, raspy voice, looking straight into his eyes and making it impossible to glance away. “I’m going to kiss you,” he announced, bringing his hands up to cup the Irishman’s face. “If you definitely don’t want me to do that, then you have five seconds to stop me.”

“What? No, Dan-“

“Five,” he cut him off and started counting. “Four.” The Dane’s face was getting closer. “Three.” Stephen wanted to scream, wanted to tell him to stop and go away, but for some reason he didn’t. He didn’t move, didn’t flinch, and Finns was hating himself right there for thinking that nothing in the history of the world had ever turned him on quite as much as Daniel’s mouth at that precise moment. Not the girls, not the porn, not even Stevie. Daniel fucking Agger’s mouth. “Two.” _Oh God_. The increasing proximity was sending out echoes of actual force and he just knew he was too weak to fight it. “One.”

Daniel pressed his lips against Finns’ tentatively, waiting to see whether he’d pull away at the last second. When Stephen didn’t move, he closed his eyes and deepened the kiss, opening his mouth just a tiny bit. The moment he felt the warmth of a tongue forcing its way inside his mouth, something occurred to him and he pushed the Dane away.

“You were blowing Luis and now you’re kissing me,” he said to the bemused boy in front of him, with a grimace. “You’re disgusting, Dan.”

Daniel laughed and shook his head. “Relax, I came prepared and brushed my teeth.”

This time, Dan wasn’t so careful. He yanked Finns forward before he could protest again, smashing their mouths together into an open-mouthed, hungry kiss. It was dirty and pushy and noisy; ragged breaths, slippery tongues and wet lips meeting. It felt as though Dan had been waiting for that kiss for a long time, had been restraining himself from doing it and didn’t intend on letting Stephen go away any time soon – a hand clenched tight in his hair was making sure of that.

It was messy. And filthy. And _oh so good_.

Stephen felt desire rising in him like a tide, taking away all caution and good sense. There was some desperate feeling of need being born out of the erratic drumming of his heart and radiating to the rest of his body, making his hair bristle and his fingers grasp at Dan’s arms with such strength his knuckles were turning white.

Daniel pulled away to let him breathe, leaving a taste of nicotine, alcohol and sex in his mouth. He hoped for God it was not a remnant of Luis’ bodily fluids, because it was just _so good_. Daniel was breathing hard against him, blowing hot air out between kisses and bites on his neck. His hands were all over the place, grabbing and touching and caressing as though the Dane was mapping out his entire body.

On some level, he knew he should be stopping Daniel. He shouldn’t let him. The guy had been with someone else just hours before and now Finns was easily giving himself away, and with a hint of desperation that was making it not even remotely dignified. But it wasn’t his head controlling his actions right then; it was something else, stronger, hungrier, completely overpowering. And the only coherent thing he could understand out of the jumble of thoughts running through his head right then was, well, thank fuck I don’t have to undo a bra right now.

It made him want to laugh.

Suddenly Daniel was finding his way into Stephen’s clothes, pulling his shirt off, undoing the laces on his pajama pants.

“Wait, wait, wait.” Labored breath, rosy lips and eyes unable to look up, he said, “I’ve never –” and stopped. Then tried again. “I’ve never… done this… before.”

He heard the smile on Dan’s face rather than saw it. “Hey,” his friend – _friend_? – said, soothingly, and pulled his chin up to face him again. He had that same gleam in his eyes Finns had seen earlier, when he was with Luis. Only this time there was something else to it. Something sweeter, more personal, more intimate. A hint of affection that appeased, at least momentarily, that flurry of anxiety making his blood boil inside his veins. And Daniel looked absolutely every fucking shade of gorgeous.

“Don’t worry.” Daniel placed a soft kiss on his temple. “It’ll be good.”

And honestly, even if he didn’t want to believe him, how could he not? Somewhere on the back of his head the word ‘inevitable’ sparkled to life as Daniel started kissing him again, and buttons were being pried open, clothes were rustling and falling away until it was just skin on skin.

The past few months had proved him a major failure at making choices. Everything he did turned out to be not exactly what he’d meant or just plain wrong and not the choice he thought he was making at all. So he decided to let Daniel make that call for him and if the throbbing hard-on he had right there was any indication, then Dan was definitely heading into the right direction.

Finns just let his eyes flutter closed. Frankly, it didn’t matter. Reason was completely out the window the minute he fell in bed with Daniel Agger.

x-x-x-x-x

Finns slowly blinked out of sleep. He groaned lazily, stretching his arms and legs into every direction under the duvet. His eyes cut to the window and the generous sliver of light seeping throw the glass to poke him in his bed.

It took him a few seconds to notice there was something missing.

Still a little dizzy from sleep, he craned his head to look around. His room was considerably emptier than it had been the night before. And quieter as well. The only pieces of clothing still lying scattered across the floor were his own. Not without feeling a little alarmed, he felt the linen on the spot next to him on the bed was already cool, apparently long left by the body that had been keeping it warm before he fell asleep.

Finns wasn’t familiar with the adequate etiquette for moments like this, but in movies it usually wasn’t a good sign when the person one had spent the night with sneaked out unnoticed.

His head started working on record speed for someone who had just woken up. Was it possible that Daniel was already regretting it? Was it possible that he had been so drunk the night before he acted out of a stupid whim and couldn’t face up to it once he’d fallen back into his good senses? No, it couldn’t be. Finns would’ve noticed if he’d been out-of-his-mind drunk. Or would he? Daniel was a good drinker. Perhaps he just knew very well how to conceal it.

Or maybe… Maybe his performance had been so bad - so awfully, ghastly, disastrously, appallingly bad that Daniel just ran away in embarrassment.

 _Oh, fuck_.

Finns pulled the duvet up to cover his face, held the fabric tightly between his teeth, muffling a loud grunt of frustration. He’d warned Daniel about his lack of… experience! But he’d tried to keep up, he did… _things_! Didn’t he? He thought Daniel was enjoying it! Maybe… Maybe he was just being polite. Maybe he was making sounds just to encourage Finns but was secretly wishing it would just be over and wondering what the hell he was thinking when he decided going up to his house had been a good idea. Maybe it was the worst sex he’d ever had in his entire life, probably the worst he would ever have. He’d become a story Daniel would tell all his friends. That one kid in Liverpool who sucked so hard he should go on record as the Worst Fuck Anyone Could Ever Have.

Oh, that was just _brilliant_.

Finns would never have the guts to face Daniel again. Ever! He’d have to quit the team and stop hanging out with the lads. He'd be like Harry, only without his wits and his charisma, so he'd just die a very slow social death until he had to go to a different school. His mom would like that; she never fancied the idea of him at Anfield anyway. She’d send him abroad to some private school somewhere dark and cold like Austria, where his life would be miserable and filled with sad pop songs about broken hearts and abandonment that would eventually turn him into a depressed, suicide-prone and sexually frustrated queer.

He was ruined. So ruined. Totally, utterly, hopelessly ruined at the age of 16.

Maybe he could write a book.

The worst part was, he had a good time. No, actually, scratch that. He had a _wonderful_ time. An awe-inspiring, breathtaking, fucking glorious time. And now he felt like such a loser.

Life, huh?

Reluctantly, Stephen managed to get up. He picked up his clothes from the floor and went to the bathroom. The long shower was spent mostly trying to remember every single thing that happened the previous night. Finns retraced every touch, every kiss, every bite – he still had a few marks on his neck, he noticed on the mirror. It didn’t help him figure out his real odds, but it did give him a hard on.

It felt equal parts sad and pathetic to jerk off thinking about the bloke who’d tag him The Worst Shag in England. Finns vaguely wondered if there was some online guide of some sort for that kind of thing. It would make everything ten thousand times worse if his embarrassment was to be made public through the world wide web. Then it wouldn't matter if he lived in Austria or Woolton, shame would walk with him wherever he went.

Finns put on some clean clothes and went to find his mobile. It chirped manically after he turned it on, revealing he had 11 new messages.

Three of them were asking about his whereabouts, in varying degrees of politeness. Two were from Pepe, one was from Harry Kewell. Finns had added the Australian's number to his mobile because Harry was on the team and they were supposed to have each other’s contacts, but that was probably the first time the name ever flashed on his screen. Harry’s text was slightly more suggestive and a lot drunker than Pepe’s. Finns would be lying if he said it didn’t make him wonder.

There was one message from Ginger informing him they were having a meeting at Sheree’s kitchen to discuss important things and telling him to show up.

The next seven were from Daniel.

_Pick up ur phone.  
**Sender: Daniel Agger, 2:12 AM**_

_Calling now, pick up.  
**Sender: Daniel Agger, 2:54 AM**_

_We have to talk. I know ur not sleepin.  
**Sender: Daniel Agger, 3:08 AM**_

_If u don’t pick up now I’m goin to ur house.  
**Sender: Daniel Agger, 3:21 AM**_

_Going to ur house NOW.  
**Sender: Daniel Agger, 3:38 AM**_

 

Well, Finns couldn’t really complain he hadn’t been warned.

The next two messages were from just a few hours earlier. His heart skipped a couple of beats as he continued reading.

_R u up yet?  
**Sender: Daniel Agger, 12:46 PM**_

_Call me when u wake up.  
**Sender: Daniel Agger, 1:12PM**_

 

Finns swallowed hard around the lump in his throat, his fingers ghosting over the screen of his mobile as he considered whether he was ready to make that phone call.

He made a mental list of all the horrible ways that conversation could go, ranging from a civilized _‘I think it was a mistake’_ to a barbarically mean _‘I’m so disgusted I want to throw up’_. Once he was convinced there was nothing Daniel could say that he hadn’t thought about yet, he dialed.

It only rang once.

“Took you long enough!” Daniel greeted him. Finns couldn’t really tell if he sounded enthusiastic or just plain annoyed.

“Good morning to you too,” he kept his cool.

“Morning? It’s two in the fucking afternoon.”

“I apologize, your highness, but this moron woke me up at four in the morning and wouldn’t let me go back to sleep.”

Finns heard the smirk on his voice. “You’re welcome, by the way.”

“I’m not thanking you.” Oh, he was. He so was.

“You should, babe.”

 _Babe_. That was a new one. What was it, like something he used to refer to people he slept with? Did he call Luis Garcia _babe_ too?

“So… How are you?” Daniel asked.

 _Worried. Paranoid. Freaking out._ “I’m good.”

“Good? That’s it?”

“What were you expecting?”

“I don’t know, maybe something more on the lines of gloriously well-fucked.”

Finns grinned in spite of himself. “Modesty is a man’s greatest virtue, Dan.”

Daniel laughed. Finns loved the sound of his laughter, even through the phone. “I can’t tell you on how many levels this is a load of bullshit, my dear Stephen.”

There was a moment of digital silence between them. The slow sound of Daniel’s breath was the only thing cutting through the stillness, and Finns hoped the Dane couldn’t hear his heart beating like a drum from the other side.

“I…” He started, stopped, unsure of what to say, then tried again. “I thought maybe you were already having second thoughts. About last night, I mean.”

“Why would I have second thoughts?”

Dan didn’t get to see the shrug. “Thought sobriety had made you regretful.”

“I wasn’t drunk, Finns.”

“You weren’t here when I woke up either.” He paused. “I’m not familiar with that kind of situation, but sneaking out doesn’t seem like a good sign.”

When Dan took two seconds too long to answer, Finns closed his eyes and braced himself for what was about to come next. _That’s it_ , he thought. _I’m done. Just get it over with, for the love of God_.

But then the Dane said, “Are you really that daft?” and he quirked an eyebrow up. “What do you reckon your mother would think if she was to find me in your room, Stephen?”

 _Oh_ , he thought. _Oh_.

“That makes sense,” he said, biting his lower lip. Of course it made sense. It made perfect sense. “It wasn’t the first thing that occurred to me,” he admitted.

“Should I ask what was the first thing to occur to you?”

“Probably not.” He wouldn’t tell anyway. “I’m not - Well, I don’t – I-” He shut his mouth, breathed hard through his nose. All those years of good education and straight A’s and he would barely find his words now. Being academically bright didn’t really make him feel smart most of the time. There were 12 year-old girls out there who were a lot better at this stuff than him.

“Finns?”

There were hundreds of things he wanted to say. To ask. To explain. But his thoughts were getting lost somewhere along the path between his brain and his mouth, the lines melting away on his tongue before he could speak. He felt this moment was supposed to be meaningful and big and… revelatory or whatever. But somehow he was ruining it.

So instead, he just asked, “What now?” and let Daniel do the talking for him.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean what happens now? I don’t know what we’re supposed to do now.”

“Nothing, I guess.”

 _Bam_! A shot right through his chest. “N-nothing?” he stuttered, and hoped his dismay hadn't been too obvious.

“It doesn’t have to mean anything.”

 _Bam, bam_! “It doesn’t?”

“You know what I mean.”

“I really don’t.”

He heard Daniel sighing. “I mean sex doesn’t have to make anything different. It’s just sex.”

“Right.” Finns paused. “Did it mean anything to do it with Luis?” Bitterness bled through.

“No! Of course not. Finns, that’s not what I said.”

“Because sex doesn’t mean anything to you.”

“Stop twisting my words.”

“That’s what you just said.”

“It’s not!”

“Yes, it is.”

“Finns!-“ Dan stopped, sighed again. “Look, you mean a lot more to me than Luis. Luis doesn’t mean anything! I wasn’t saying that last night didn’t mean anything. It meant a lot to me.”

“Well, you did bang two guys in one night. That has to be a good score even for you.” Oh, he was so, so bitter…

“Stephen,” Daniel said, calmly, pronouncing every syllable of his name very carefully, like he always did when he wanted his full attention or meant to be irrefutable. Like he’d been the night before. Daniel was the only one of his friends who used his first name and, even though he did get to call him Finns as well now, there was still something in the way he said it that sent a shiver up Finns’ spine. Daniel made his name sound like porn sometimes. He wished his mother could hear it.

Now, though, he pronounced it on a serious tone, with a hint of sternness that stopped the paranoia in his head just enough so that he could listen.

“First of all, I didn’t fuck Luis. I might have, if you hadn’t walked in on us, then my heart wasn’t in it anymore because I could think about was you. I finished what I had already started out of courtesy, but that was all.” _Not that it makes me feel any better_ , Finns thought, but refrained from interrupting. “Second, last night meant something because of _you_. I couldn’t care less about Luis. He was there and he was easy, that’s all.”

Finns snorted derisively.

“Don’t snort at me,” Dan admonished. “I’m into you. I told you that, you ran away scared.”

“No, I didn’t!” Finns protested.

“Really? Then what do you call it?”

“I just…” Finns thought for a moment and then gave in to defeat. “Ran away scared.”

“Exactly.”

“I didn’t think you really meant it.”

“Why would I say something like that unless I meant it?”

“’Cause you’re my friend and you were trying to make me feel better?”

Dan paused. “Right, that would be a good reason.” He didn’t see the arched eyebrow on Finns’ face. “But it’s not why I said it.”

“If you’re so into me, how come you didn’t care when the boys got Harry to hit on me?”

“I’m not your boyfriend, Finns. It’s not my place to tell you who you can or cannot hook up with. But that’s not to say I didn’t care, I just didn’t want to meddle.”

“You held a very strong case against Stevie,” the Irishman pointed out.

“That’s because it was stupid!” Daniel bellowed with irritation. Stevie was always a sore spot for the Dane, for many, many reasons, some of which Finns couldn’t even understand. “It was a horrible idea and you were going to get hurt. I was trying to protect you.”

“Either that or you just don’t like Stevie.”

“I like him even less now.”

“You should watch your words, Agger, or I might get the false impression that you were jealous.”

Stephen heard the distinct sound of air being sucked in. “Well, maybe because I was.”

He sat straight up on his bed, surprised. Now that was something he wasn’t expecting. “That’s news.”

“It’s not, really. You’re my best friend, Finns. I hated to see you drooling over Stevie like some stupid fangirl all the time.”

“Hey! I never-“

“And I hated it even more because I knew Stevie would never look at you the way you wanted him to.” Dan had a way of pointing things out to him in the most harsh and artless manner. It could easily be mistaken by lack of concern for other people’s feelings, but, if you looked closer, it was just Daniel’s way of showing affection. His honesty was bare and raw, and after a bumpy start, Stephen had come to appreciate it very much, regardless of how much it stung sometimes.

Not that he always accepted it or understood at first. But eventually it ended up making sense, much to his dislike.

“I was there by your side all the time and all you could think about was Steven Gerrard. I got sick pretty quickly of how everything always seems to lead to school hero Stevie around here.”

“So you were jealous of the attention Stevie gets from everyone, not because of me.”

“I was jealous because he was not only getting the attention of everyone else, but also, and especially, yours.”

Finns smiled, though not sure why. “I’m done with Stevie, Dan. I’ve been done with Stevie for a while now.”

“Good,” his friend said simply.

“Yeah,” he agreed.

Neither of them spoke for a while, letting the nerves cool down a little before they continued. This was a recurrent problem lately; any conversation they started would bend into a different direction and before they even noticed it would turn into an argument that invariably ended with them not speaking properly for days. That was the last thing Finns wanted right now.

Months of hanging out with Daniel and he was finally starting to pick up on the nuance. Being friends with that kid was a fine art that had demanded a lot of practice and large doses of patience. But it appeared that it was about to finally start paying off.

“So… What about us?” The word ‘us’ tasted funny on his tongue.

“Well,” Dan started, calm again. “We don’t have to do anything we don’t want to, for starters.”

“Continue.”

“Just look at what happened when we started overthinking everything. You got weird, we started fighting and it was not fun anymore. I hate this bullshit, Finns. I hate dealing with those petty little things. But we’re not like that. We just have to stop making simple things complicated.”

Finns wasn’t sure he was still following. “What do you mean?”

“I mean let’s just be ourselves. We’re friends, and it so happens, like it often does when attractive people become friends -" Finns rolled his eyes, "- that I’m attracted to you, and you’re attracted to me. We don’t have to make a big deal out of it. It’s not like we’re in a relationship, we’re just… Enjoying ourselves to the fullest.”

Finns laughed shortly. “That’s some way to put it.”

“It’s the truth. I’m tired of crap, let’s just go back to the way we were, ok? I really miss you, Finns. I haven’t really got anyone else.”

It so turned out that Finns really did miss Daniel as well. When he wasn’t being an ass, he was a great company. Sometimes he could be good company even while being an ass, which Stephen reckoned was something akin to a gift. Not many people could manage it.

But there was a part about ' _going back to being ourselves_ ' that he wasn't looking after with enthusiasm.

Hesitant, he asked, “So we just leave last night behind?”

“Behind? Are you insane? No fucking way!” Daniel spoke, avidly. “I mean… Unless you want to. Do you?”

“I… No.”

“Oh, thank God,” the younger boy said, exhaling in relief.

Finns laughed outright. “That horny, are you, Agger?”

“Don’t give me all the credit, darling. You were a pretty great shag.”

Finns beamed largely with pride and felt just a little bit ridiculous, but mostly damn good. He was a good shag! And to think he had been fretful about his abilities as a lover…

“So we’ll be like fuck buddies?”

“I prefer friends with benefits.”

“Friends with benefits.” he echoed.

He imagined one of the guys on the team asking ‘ _So, Finns, are you and Dan going out?_ ’ and him saying ‘ _No, Daniel and I are just friends with benefits_.’ Sounded posh and mature, like stuff grown-ups do. He liked it.

“Yes. We hang out, we tell jokes, we get pissed, we play football, we go to the diner or to our stupid school, same as we always have, and then, if we also feel like it, we do… the other stuff as well.”

“With each other.”

“Obviously.”

“What about other people?”

Daniel considered it for a moment. “We can do it with other people too.”

“So we’re not exclusive?”

“Friends with benefits are not exclusive. We won’t be dating.”

“Right.”

“Is that a problem?”

Finns thought back about the scene at Sheree’s party, about finding Dan sucking off Luis Garcia, looking happy and horny and thoroughly satisfied. He thought about that gut-wrenching feeling he had, about how he just wanted to snatch Daniel away and make him his and only his. He thought about dead pandas.

But he couldn’t. Daniel wasn’t his. Daniel was nobody’s.

“No,” he said, and he was only half-lying.

“You sure?”

“Yeah. I’m sure.”

“Ok then.”

“So you’ll be doing it with Luis?” Which was not to say he wouldn't be getting jealous...

“You have a real problem with Luis, don’t you? Wanna talk about it?” He could almost see the bright, self-satisfied smirk on Daniel's face.

“No. You can fuck Luis if you want, I don’t care.”

“You know, that’s the second time you tell me that and it sounded just as bad as the first. You should try practicing it a little bit before trying again.”

“Bite me, Daniel.”

“Oh, I have, babe. Will gladly do it again.”

Finns heedlessly moved his free hand to the still sore spot where Daniel’s teeth had taken particular interest on the flesh. He'd have to come up with story to tell his mother. She was that kind of lady who’d rather pretend her son would never have sex in his life and felt genuinely horrified to even hear anything suggesting it. She didn’t like Daniel very much already, what with the smoking and the tattoos; if she knew what he’d been up to with her son, she’d never let the Dane near that house ever again.

“You know,” Daniel forged on. “Keep me busy enough and I won’t have to go looking for Luis. He has a sweet ass –” Finns cringed, “- but I’d much rather take my time with you.”

It wasn’t ideal, but it was something. Finns should take what he could get from Daniel. “Shut up, Dan.” Not that he’d ever mention that to his friend.

“So what about you?”

“What about me?”

“Do you have something in mind? _Someone_?” Dan stressed the last word. “Someone like _Harry Kewell_?”

“I have nothing with Harry Kewell, Daniel, nor will I ever have.”

“He’s good looking enough, I suppose. Nothing like me, but he’s ok.”

‘Ok’ was a bit of a loose description for Harry Kewell. The guy was probably the most coveted body at Anfield High. He’d made his way into practically everyone’s beds, boy or girl. He wasn’t just ‘ok’; he was ridiculously hot.

Not that Finns was interested, of course.

“Are you trying to push me to Harry? ‘Cause if you don’t want me, I can just –”

“Don’t start it, Finnan. I’d die three times before I handed you over to anyone else. But it’s a fact Harry would like to fuck you.”

“Do they teach you how to be a gentleman like that in Denmark?”

“Harry would be inclined to make sweet, sweet love to you. Is that better?”

Finns rolled his eyes. “Not going to be making love to anyone, Dan.”

“Aw, come on, Finns!” he began his protest. “I didn’t –”

“Will you just relax there, mate? I won’t be making love to you. We’ll be _fucking_ each other’s brains out.”

He had no idea where that had come from, but it seemed like the right thing to say at the moment. Good thing the Dane couldn’t see his dark pink cheeks, it didn’t really match very well with the lust in his words. He was a newbie breaking into new territory, but he reckoned he'd have all the time in the world to learn his ways.

“That’s more like it, babe. I see you’re a quick learner.”

“You have no idea.”

“I’m willing to find out.”

“You will.”

“Great.”

“Great.”

“Fantastic.”

“I know.”

“Bloody awesome.”

“Definitely.”

“So do you wanna come over now?”

“Inc- Wait, what?”

“My parents are not home.”

“Jesus, Daniel. Don’t you ever rest?”

“I’ll rest when I’m old and incapable of getting it up. Plus, do you have any idea how long I’ve been waiting to have my way with your Irish self?”

“Am I to make from that that you only became friends with me to have your way with my Irish self?” He paused. “At least you got my nationality right for once.”

“Absolutely not, Stephen. But I have been taking close looks at you for a while now and I usually don’t take too long hunting, if you know what I mean. You should be honored, I courted you.”

“You _courted_ me?”

“Yes, I did. I worked my way up the ladder slowly.”

“Yes, by tackling me to bed and taking my clothes off after threatening to break my window.”

“I do believe some people would call that romantic. And you liked it very much.”

"Clearly you have no idea what romance is, Daniel. And I did _not_ appreciate almost getting a rock to the head at four in the morning. It missed me by an inch, I could've died."

"I mean the sex, Finnan."

“That’s a different subject. I’m afraid to tell you, though, that in Great Britain as well as in Ireland, whatever it is that you did, it was most definitely not courting.”

“It is to me. I took my time winning you over, now I want to enjoy it. Can you blame me?”

“Don’t you think we should take it slowly?”

“What for?”

“So we won’t get tired of it quickly.”

Daniel was quiet for a spell. “Do you think you’ll get tired?”

“No… But I think you could.” It was true. Daniel seemed like the kind of person who would go all in into a new adventure, but who’d get disinterested just as fast.

“I won’t if you don’t.”

“How do you know that?”

“I wouldn’t have gone through so much trouble for something I’d lose my interest on.”

“But… what if we do?”

“Well, then we’ll just deal with it.”

“What if just one of us do?”

“Then the other will just have to accept it.”

To Finns, it sounded harsh. Maybe a little bit too harsh. He knew he was most likely the one who’d get left behind on the scale of interest there. Daniel could take over the world if he wanted, whereas he’d always be just the boy next door who was a good enough shag but not a heart breaker.

That’s what his life had always been like. He was always the one left to pick up the pieces of his own shattered heart. Over and over and over, since the first time he could remember ever liking anyone. Daniel was into him, all right. But for how long? How long until someone prettier, smarter and more knowledgeable in the arts of sex came along?

He should cut if off and tell him no, tell him it was a bad idea and that they shouldn’t. This would most likely end just like everything else always had for him: in tears he wouldn't even shed because he wasn't the crying type, but that would eat him away inside.

But then he was thinking about Daniel’s laughter, and Daniel’s completely inappropriate but hysterical jokes, Daniel’s kisses, Daniel’s touches, Daniel’s…

He was way past the point of no return.

“Then it’s a deal,” he said, and hoped for the best.

“So are you coming over to seal the deal?”

Finns just shook his head. “Fine, Daniel. I’ll go. Let me just eat something first.”

“Of course. I need you to be strong.”

“Oh, shut it, Agger. Is it going to be just sex, sex, sex with you now?”

“Don’t worry, Stephen. It will be sex, sex, sex for you too soon enough.”

“I’m hanging up.”

“See you!”

He turned off his phone, his ear burning from holding the mobile too long against it. Finns didn’t even know when he started smiling, but there he was.

Too late to go back now.

x-x-x-x-x-x

_**Epilogue** _

_The following summer…_

He didn’t even bother knocking before kicking the door open and storming into his best friend’s bedroom.

“I can’t take this anymore!”, Finns announced dramatically as he threw himself over Daniel Agger’s bed unceremoniously.

Daniel didn’t even bat him an eyelid, already used to Stephen’s tendency towards overreaction. 

“Hello to you too, Stephen.”

“I can’t, Dan,” he continued, seething with exasperation and ignoring the fact Daniel hadn’t asked. “I am one step away from jumping out my fucking window.”

Daniel inhaled deeply, calmly closed the magazine he had had been flipping through before Finn’s grand entrance and put it aside. Sitting straight on his bed, he eyed his friend studiously, like a therapist about to start a session with a patient. Stephen was like that; he liked to have his morning toasts with drama. That’s what you get when you spoil children beyond repair, Daniel guessed. He just had to indulge him a little bit, let him vent, and he’d be as good as new. “What happened?”

“It’s my mother!” the Irishman clamored. “I got home today and there was this huge pile of university brochures on my bed!”

“Oh, damn it. Brochures. I can’t stand them either.”

“Daniel!” Finnan directed him a steely gaze that was too much like a silent growl, and maybe also a threat. Daniel held out his palms in the air in surrender. “She’s driving me mad. All she’s been talking about is university this, university that. I can’t even eat, or watch television, or take a dump in my own bathroom without my mother bursting in to start babbling about her goddamned brochures! ‘ _Stephen, have you read it yet? Stephen, let’s discuss your thoughts on which universities your father and I think are better suited for you. Stephen, you’re ruining your life, you’ll end up living in a shelter and selling your body for a piece of old fucking bread_ ’!” he ranted, making a funny face to accompany the little voice that was supposed to be his mother’s. It was not so far from reality, actually.

Daniel’s eyebrows shot upwards in mild shock. “Your own mother said that?”

Finnan exhaled heavily. “No. Not with those words. But it’s what she meant!” He rubbed his face with both his hands. “She’s scheduled interviews, Daniel. Interviews!” Stephen puffed out a heavy gust of air, letting his arms fall roughly beside his body. “But that’s not even the worst part.”

“There’s something worse than cursing her own child?”

Finns’ eyes moved back to him, and this time there was something clearly different about him. His expression relaxed, his indignation dimmed into some deep-rooted sadness. Stephen looked defeated, almost powerless. It wasn’t just a poor rich kid having another fickle fit. Not entirely, at least.

“She wants me to move to the US,” he said, woefully.

“That’s not the worst part.” Daniel shrugged. “Just tell her that you won’t.”

Finnan propped himself up on his elbows and shook his head. “Do you think I haven’t already? I told her a thousand times that I’d much rather go to Liverpool University, or something in London, or even back to Ireland. I even got her the bloody brochures she loves so much, I presented her numbers and facts, I proved there are good universities right here on this side of the Atlantic.”

“You have a very weird family, you know that?”

Finnan just ignored him. “She’s just not having it. It’s either the US or the US for her.”

“What about your father?”

His lips quirked up into a wan smile. He didn’t even need to answer.

“She can’t make you. Just tell her that you’re not going and she’s gonna have to bottle it. She’s your mother, she won't really abandon you. I think.”

Finns sighed. “You don’t know what my parents are like, Dan,” he explained. “I can’t say no to this. I mean, I can, but that would mean I’d have to live with their disappointment for the rest of my life. She’d bring it up whenever she got a chance. I’d have to dedicate myself to living without ever failing at anything just so that I’d never give her a chance to throw it back at me.”

“Jesus,” Daniel shook his head. He always thought money was the answer to all problems, but after meeting Finns he came to realize it could sometimes also be the source of all torment. Finns could be a very weird, very spoilt person at times, but, all things considered, he turned out to be almost down to earth, compared to the rest of his bunch. “You should just get yourself some new parents.”

Finns just shook his head with dismal. “They’ve done everything for me my whole life, there’s not a single thing I have wanted they haven’t gone out of their way to get me, and they’ve never asked for anything in return. I know you think my mother is crazy, and she can be like that, but somewhere in her twisted mind she thinks she’s doing the best for my future or whatever. I can’t deny them that.”

Daniel bit his lips pensively, starting to realize where Finns was going with his rant. He was a spoilt little brat, yes, but he wasn’t irrational. His parents always gave him everything. He even had a bloody pony when he was a kid. But Stephen never lost sight of the fact he owed them all that, and that at some point he’d like to pay it back by making them proud of him somehow. “I see.”

“I can’t believe I’m gonna have to move to another continent,” Finns grumbled, utterly desolated.

“Oh, come on,” Dan tried to sound cheerful, sliding down on the bed to lie on his side next his friend. “You still have one year left of school before you have to really think about that.”

“But that’s exactly what I was telling you! I don’t! She’s giving me a fucking headache, I don’t have a moment of peace anymore! I’m gonna have to take all these tests, and write essays, meet people, go to interviews – I can’t even process the fact she wants me to move away, let alone do anything else!”

“Stephen, you have good grades, you’re on the football team, you’re stinking rich. There is absolutely no chance you’ll have a single college application denied.”

“You always have to point out the fact my money will make sure I get everything.”

“It’s usually what happens.”

“But I don’t want to get anywhere because of my bloody money, I want to earn it!” he said, raising his tone in annoyance. “I just wish I wouldn’t have to cross the fucking ocean for that.”

“Your mother must really hate me,” Daniel said, thoughtfully. Finns cocked him an eyebrow and lay back down on the bed. “She’s getting her only child out of the country just to make sure you won’t be around me anymore.”

The Irishman huffed a short laugh. “She really does hate you,” he said, closing his eyes. “But that’s not why she’s doing this.”

“Hey,” the Dane started, placing one hand on Stephen’s head and brushing his fingers gently through his hair. “Don’t think about that now. No matter what she says, you have time.”

“I can’t think about anything else,” he admitted. “All I think about all the time is that I’ll have to leave everything.”

“It’s the USA, Finns, not Iraq. It’s not that different from here.”

“Daniel. Everything,” he repeated, eyes flying open to give him a pointed look.

“Yeah, sure, they call football soccer, but that’s not the end of the world –“

“For the love of God, Daniel,” Finnan cried, lifting one hand to the Dane’s chin and turning his face to make sure he’d be looking straight into his eyes as he spoke it once again, in a clipped tone. “ _Every. Thing_.”

 _Oh_. “Oh.”

“Yes, oh.”

He hadn’t thought about that part at all.

“Well,” he said in amidst an audible sigh, all the implications of having his best friend, who also happened to be his fuck buddy – his _only_ fuck buddy – living thousands of miles away from him for probably forever beginning to dawn on him. “We still have an entire year ahead of us. Just don’t torture yourself over that right now, a lot could happen in a year.”

“Yeah,” Finnan agreed sadly. “But my mother changing her mind won’t.”

“Shhhh,” Daniel murmured, moving closer to Finns and placing a kiss on his shoulder. A mischievous grin broke onto his lips. “If you promise to be very, very quiet, I can make you feel better.” His hand caressed Finns’ arm, all the way down to his hand, pressing lightly on his fingers before moving to land on his crotch, tugging a little on his jeans. He felt the Irishman’s body stiffening next to his.

“Your mother’s not home,” Finns said under a shuddering breath.

“Wait,” Dan immediately pulled away and sat on the bad, looking down on Finns. “My mother’s not home?”

Stephen blinked at him, confused. “No, she asked me to tell you she was going to the store or something when she let me it. Why?”

“Why?!” He jumped to his feet, disbelief and indignation written all over his face. “We’ve been alone in the house all this time and you only tell me this now?!”

“Excuse me!” Finnan sat down on the bed, crossed his arms over his chest and frowned in irritation. “I had issues!”

Daniel walked to the door, popped his head out and shouted, “Mooom!” When no answer came, he shut the door closed and locked it, turning to the boy on his bed. “Honestly, Stephen,” he tsked. “Have you not learned anything from me yet? I’ve been trying so hard to educate you.”

Finns cocked him an eyebrow. “You, educating me?”

Dan moved over and straddled the Irish boy, pushing him with one hand to lie back down on his bed. He thought his friend to be very attractive almost all the time, what with his strong, angular jaw, sultry big lips and even the permanent creases on his forehead that made him look constantly bored and slightly smarter than everyone else. But this was, hands down, his favorite angle of Finns: underneath him, overtaken by desire, so close he couldn't tell whether his eyes were green or grey or both.

Standing on his knees and with a hand on each side of the older boy’s head, Daniel let his lewd intentions bleed out clear on his sinful grin. He leant down so close that he could almost feel his every breath tingling at Stephen’s mouth. “Sex tops issues,” he started, “Because sex eases away all issues and makes you feel better.”

“You know, Dan, sometimes I think you only want me for my body.” Finns feigned irritation, but his grin was awkward and wide.

“You do have a very nice body, Stephen,” he replied matter-of-factly, to which Stephen laughed outright. “Don’t worry, babe,” Daniel continued, leaning down to latch his teeth onto the skin on his friend’s neck. “By the time I’m done with you, your mother will be the last thing on your mind.”

x-x-x

Finns took a deep, contended breath, rejoicing in the amazing sensation of perfect completeness in the afterglow. For one brilliant full second the world had been a marvelous place, his shitty day had been worth it and his mother’s brochures could very well be damned. But then the moment was gone and reality had sped up to ruin his little spell of glory. He was vaguely staring at Daniel’s white ceiling, listening to the rustling sound of the breeze coming in through the window and dancing with the curtains, only faintly aware of Dan’s weight over his left arm.

The Dane was lying half on top of him, one leg draped over his, a hand caressing his stomach. He could feel the boy’s breath against his neck, hot and ragged and still fighting its way back into normalcy.

Wherever he looked in that room, there was something to be remembered. That one time they had sex against the dresser (fun), against the bathroom door (a challenge), on that chair (not very comfortable), on the floor (fantastic night, that one); that epic battle of FIFA that should go on record as the Best Match Ever Played on a Videogame; that day when Daniel tricked him into a drinking game and he still couldn’t remember how he’d woken up wearing a cape on Daniel’s bed. That time when they just stayed there and did nothing together and it had been a great day.

Daniel was right, he wasn’t thinking about his mother anymore. Now it was all about how in a year’s time all this would be gone. The best time he ever had in his brief life would be in the past. Daniel would be here, having other boys in his room, and he’d be millions of light-years away, in America.

What he was thinking now was: how would he live without all this?

With his heart stuttering a little bit, Finns opened his mouth and the words just came out, as though out of their own volition.

“We should stop.”

“Stop what?” Stephen loved Daniel’s post-sex voice; it was just above a purr. But right then it was making him cringe. It was so much more difficult to do this with Daniel speaking on that voice against his neck.

“Seeing each other,” he spat out.

The feeling of Dan’s breath against his skin ceased for a moment, and it took the boy a very long second to react. “What?”

“We should stop seeing each other.” Like repeating it in one sentence made it any more agreeable.

Daniel moved, propped himself up on his elbow, fixing Finns under his very inquisitive gaze. Stephen’s eyes flickered away from him, to the door, the ceiling, his jacket hanging on the back of Daniel’s chair. And then back again. “Did you smoke something?” the Dane finally asked.

“I was thinking -”

“Then stop thinking, it’s clearly worse than pot for you.”

“Just hear me out, Daniel –“

“No,” he cut him off decisively and got up. “Have you heard yourself? You’re not making any sense.”

“I know, but –“

“Eh, eh! I don’t wanna hear it. Clearly your brain must still be shaking inside your head from all that rocking we just did. Take a moment, breathe, close your eyes, stop saying bullshit. You’ll be ashamed of how stupid you just sounded in five minutes and I’ll kindly offer to leave it in the past for a blowjob. That’s how good I am, you’d be the stupidest person to ever walk this earth to stop seeing me.” He punctuated his speech with a wink, struggled out of the duvet and padded his way outside the bedroom, a quick look down the corridor to make sure his mother hadn’t arrived quietly. 

“Feel free to join me in the shower!” he shouted as he went to the bathroom. Soon enough Stephen could hear the sound of water running.

Finns sat on the bed, still feeling tingly and sore and very well shagged. And then he couldn't take it anymore. Before he could even figure out what he was doing, he was already all dressed up, flying down the stairs and into the streets of Liverpool.

 

x-x-x

A large grin of anticipation graced Stevie’s face as he opened the door to the ice cream shop. He was supposed to meet Xabi there, but his boyfriend would be running late, which meant he’d have just the right amount of time to indulge in his ice cream addiction without the Spaniard’s judgmental watch. He loved that his boyfriend was this much invested on their footballing high school careers, but sometimes he wished Xabi wouldn’t make him feel like he was taking Rafa Benítez on a date.

He took his time picking the flavor; half chocolate, half pistachio. Some would call it a conservative choice; Stevie preferred classic.

Just as he turned around to find himself a place to sit, he spotted Steve Finnan on the corner, by himself, head down, looking at his own hands. Stevie frowned. Finns hadn’t even noticed he was there.

“Hey, Finns,” he greeted him with a smile, approaching his friend, who blinked up at him like he had been suddenly dragged out of some very deep thought.

“Hey,” he said, slightly startled. “Stevie, hi. I didn’t see you coming in.”

“I noticed.” He stuck his spoon in his ice cream, filled it with both pistachio and chocolate, and then took it to his mouth. “What are you doing alone here?” he spoke, his mouth still full.

“I could ask you the same thing,” Finns grinned sheepishly.

“I’m supposed to meet Xabi, but he’ll take a while longer, so I’m a little early. What’s your excuse?”

He opened his mouth once, then snapped it shut again and just shrugged. “I have none.”

There was an awkward moment of silence, during which Stevie considered whether it would be appropriate to sit down with his friend. But then sitting down by himself while Finns was there felt just as weird. They left the awkwardness behind a long time ago.

“Do you mind if I…” Stevie inquired, pointing to the chair.

It took Finns maybe a moment longer than it should, but he eventually nodded. “Sure, sit down.”

Stevie offered him a taste of his ice cream by pointing at it with his spoon as he made himself comfortable, receiving a graceful shake of head in refusal. After another spell of silence, he decided it was best to just ask.

“Is everything ok, Finns?”

“Sure,” the other boy said, a bit too cheery for honesty, his lips twisting into a wan smile that looked more like a grimace than anything else.

“You seem… strange. I mean… You’re sitting here, by yourself… Having only water when there are 10 thousand incredible flavors of ice cream right there, just… Thoughtful. You weren’t even paying attention when I walked in, just… A bit… lost, maybe.” In times like these, Stevie missed having Xabi there. He always knew what to say, always picked the perfect words, while he was just plain clumsy. It was kinda embarrassing that he was the native English speaker in their relationship.

Although, on second thought... Well, he and Finns never, ever spoke of that crazy, reckless night again. And he hadn't told Xabi about it either. They eventually made peace, Xabi naturally drifted away from Harry and now they were happy like they'd never been before. It just didn't feel right to spoil it for something that didn't really mean anything and that would absolutely never happen again. He felt terrible for months after, but made sure to make Xabi the happiest boyfriend in the world as a way of appeasing his own uneasiness.

It didn't mean, however, that Stevie didn't feel weird having Finns and Xabi side by side. They got along ok, but weren't the best of friends either, which made Stevie very glad. He rarely ever had to make conversation with the two of them at the same time outside the football pitch.

“It’s just my mom,” Finns said, poking his own mobile over the table with his fingers and emphatically not meeting his eyes. “She’s giving me a hard time with this whole senior year thing. I mean, summer just started and she won’t stop nagging me. I got pissed and decided to get out of the house.”

“And you came here because…”

He shrugged. “Thought it was a safe place to hide. She’d never come to look for me here.”

Stevie nodded in comprehension, stuck another spoon of ice cream in his mouth. It still didn’t make any sense, if anything because there was a major piece being left out of his story. “So where’s Daniel?”

Finns immediately stopped playing with his mobile, his hand freezing for a second, his eyes becoming cloudy and sad. It lasted for just a split second, but the elephant in the room became impossibly obvious.

Ever since the pair of them started hanging out, there hadn’t been a single moment when Steve Finnan and Daniel Agger weren’t together, or at least about to meet. They had completely stolen the spotlight away from him and Xabi to become the team’s favorite source of banter, something Stevie was very much grateful for.

Not only did it give him and Xabi peace, but also, because of Finns, Daniel now was almost not completely obnoxious. He actually managed to be a nice guy most of the time. Finns, on the other hand, had turned into a much more confident and outgoing person, even with his footballing skills. It was a win-win situation. Stevie never thought that having two other people sleeping together on their group could be so rewarding.

The Irishman didn’t even need to confirm with words that something was rotten in the state of Denmark. As if summoned by sheer power of thinking, the phone started ringing, and Daniel Agger’s name flashed on the screen. Finns exhaled, ignored the call, and finally raised his gaze to meet Stevie’s.

“I kind of broke up with him.”

Stevie nearly spat his ice cream on Finns’ face there.

“You did what?!”

Finns shrank back on his seat, fidgeting uncomfortably. “I told him we had to stop seeing each other.”

“Why?!” Stevie asked, with maybe a little bit too much drive, only then realizing that it was probably not helping. “Sorry,” he retracted, lowering his tone to one closer to comprehension and comfort. “But why would you do that? What happened? Did Daniel do something?”

“Daniel didn’t do anything.”

“Well, then I’m completely lost here." This had Daniel’s name written all over it. It was so like him to go and screw things up with his explosive way of dealing with everything. But if Finns was saying it wasn't Daniel, then... "You two were fine yesterday.”

“Yeah… He’s probably just as confused as you are right now. I was at his house, we were –“ he paused, arching eyebrows at Stevie to make it clear that they were not playing videogames. “- hanging out. And I freaked out, broke up with him and ran away while he was in the bathroom.” He made a second pause to ignore another call from Daniel.

“Finns,” Stevie interjected, a little shocked there. It seemed a pretty horrible way to end things with a person, even if said person was as moronic as Agger was most of the time.

“Hey.” Stevie sought after Finns’ hand with his own, placing it over his and squeezing lightly. “Tell me what happened.”

“I’m not sure,” he started. “My mother is sending me to the USA for college after school’s over.”

“Is Daniel upset about that?”

Finns just shook his head. “Not at all. If he’s fazed, he didn’t let it show. The problem is not Daniel, it’s me. I can’t deal with that.”

“Deal with what?”

“Well, in just about a year I’ll be crossing the ocean to a different continent, God knows when or even _if_ I’ll ever be back. Daniel will still have two more years of high school before him, and he’s probably not going there anyway. Our lives are just going to take on completely different paths. I’ll be by myself, he’ll be here with you lot. How are we supposed to keep anything going on?”

“It makes sense…” Stevie considered. “But you still have a year before you have to move.”

“Yes, but…” Finns swallowed, licked his lips. “The longer we wait, the harder it will be. It’s better if I just rip it off like a band-aid, you know? It hurts, but it heals quicker.”

“Wow, Finns,” Stevie sat back against his chair, his ice cream completely forgotten. “That takes a lot of guts. I mean, if I was in your place I don’t think I could ever do that. Break up with Xabi. Hell, I don’t think I’d break up with him even if his parents shipped him off to Alaska.”

“But we’re not like you and Xabi,” Finns simply stated, a ghost of a little grin easing, if only a little bit, the sadness on his features. “We’re nothing like you guys. Daniel is…” he trailed off, eyes flickering away for a moment, then back again. “He’s a free spirit. He doesn’t belong to anyone. Not to me, not to anyone else.”

“But I thought you guys were exclusive.”

“We are. But I never asked Daniel for exclusiveness. It just… happened. He offered it out of his own will. With him it’s like you have to earn that kind of thing.”

“But… Then… What’s the matter?” Stevie wasn’t following Finns at all there.

“The matter…” The older boy started, breathing deeply, probably trying to make sense out of his own feelings. “The matter is that I fell in love with my best friend.” He said, his voice cracking up a little bit, with a smile that didn’t quite meet his eyes. Finnan looked completely miserable as he admitted the glaring truth, and Stevie had the sensation maybe he was the first one to hear it, even before Dan.

“Whatever happens before I have to go, it won’t change the fact that I will leave. And I can’t be miles away from him wondering what he’s doing, _who_ he’s doing, whether he’s found someone else or not. It’s bad enough that I’ll lose my best friend, if I have to endure the loss of everything else as well…” Another pause, and then, “I could either spend the rest of the year falling even more deeply in love with him, to the point where I’d probably not have enough courage to break it up, and then drive myself crazy with paranoia, or… I can stop this part, the part where we act like we're together without actually being together and make things even more complicated for me, and have a whole year to get used to the idea of not having him anymore.”

Finns felt so utterly at loss, so completely desolated in front of him that it knocked the air out of Stevie’s lungs for a moment. Right there, Finnan looked twice his age, heavy with the awareness that he’d have his heart broken at some near point in the future. So calm and so resigned Stevie was instantaneously taken with compassion for his friend.

Stevie felt bad that he wasn’t smarter right then, he didn’t have the right words in him to offer some kind of comfort, however flimsy it might have been.

“Anyway,” Finns spoke again. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said all that. It just came out. I’m not even sure what I’m on about.”

“It’s all right. You sounded like you really needed to get it out.”

He smiled kindly. “Thanks.”

Stevie bit his lip to try and keep his big mouth shut. He did. He really, really did. But then, “Finns, I’m sorry, but –“ He stopped, palms down on the table. “Are you sure you wanna do this? I know Dan’s this free horse –“

“Free spirit.”

“Yes, that. Spirit. I know he’s like that – I mean, I don’t, but you know him better than anyone else, so you do, and you just said it, so. You know what I mean. What I’m trying to say is, maybe you’re underestimating him. Or his ability to commit, truly commit to someone.”

"I don't think so.”

“Well, maybe he’ll want to be together. You just fled from his house, right? Maybe he’s been calling you to tell you he wants to commit to you and be faithful whatever may come.”

“Who says I want him to?”

“You… don’t? But you just said-“

“If I asked him, he’d probably accept. It would bother him to no end, but he’d even call me his boyfriend. Daniel would do whatever I ask him to. He always does. I only let him think he’s in control all the time, but in reality I’m much better at pulling the strings than he is.” Being an only child could be very lonely sometimes, especially growing up in ridiculously big houses, but it had its perks, Stevie thought. “But I’d never ask him to do something that would stain our friendship forever. It’s just not who he is. I'd be happy for a month or two and then he'd start hating me and we'd break up and never be friends again. I don't want that. In fact, I don't need that. We’re good the way we are. We were, at least.”

“But he’s crazy about you, Finns.”

“I know.”

“Do you think he’ll just let you break up with him like that?”

“He will. He’ll probably complain a bit, whine and yell and get all Crazy Dane on me, but once he’s done ranting, he’ll just accept it and move on.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Finns said with a sad smile. “He’s not in love with me. He loves me, but not in the same way I love him.”

Stevie just sat there, gaping, not really sure what had just happened. His brain was still trying to process how he’d gone from flat, innocent excitement about ice cream to feeling such deep-rooted dismal about not being able to offer a hand in help to a friend. He didn’t even know what to say. He didn’t really care for Dan, but Stephen was a nice guy. Nice people didn’t deserve to feel like that.

The whole subject of the conversation tugged at something inside him, made him desperately miss Xabi.

“Jesus, Finns,” he said, after a while, still baffled. “When did you get this smart?”

The Irishman laughed a little bit, which was quite good. The tension had been way too thick for a couple of teenagers to properly deal with. “I’ve always been smart, you’re just too used to Xabi. No one’s that smart compared to him.”

“That’s true.”

“So,” Finns said, trying to sound cheerful. “Where is Xabi?”

“He should be here any minute.” Stevie paused. “Are you staying?”

“A little longer, I guess.”

“I can keep you company then,” Stevie offered.

“Nah, that’s ok. I’ve dropped too much on you already, wouldn’t want to finish ruining your mood before you meet with your boyfriend.”

“We can talk about something else.” And then suddenly he remembered. “I have something to share that might make you feel a little better!” Stevie was almost bouncing in excitement on his seat. Finns just observed him with curiosity. Stevie leant forward on the table and lowered his voice. “Rafa’s bringing a new striker to the team this year. He went after the guy himself, he’ll give him a football scholarship. From what I’ve heard, he’s the next big thing.”

“Wow,” Finns blinked, probably not as enthusiastic over the news as Stevie had hoped for, but it was good enough. “Where is he from?”

“Spain! He comes from Madrid, I think he’s a friend of Pepe’s. This, Finns, could be the turning point of our lives!”

Finns smiled at him, and this time there was only a faint trace of grief there. It wasn’t perfect, but it was something already.

“Tell me more about this striker.”

“Well,” Stevie started, pulling his chair closer, beaming like a child on Christmas Eve. “I’m not too sure yet, but from the bits of information my sources got me, I can assure you he’ll turn our worlds upside down.”

 

x-x-x

 

He saw him sitting on the stairs before his front door as soon as he turned around the corner.

Head down, a light furrow between his eyebrows, Daniel looked pensive, deeply lost in his own thoughts. Unfortunately, Finns knew him well enough to know that his friend worked pretty much like a tsunami: he was always calmer before the giant wave came and washed over everyone. He considered turning on his heels and disappearing for another couple of hours, but it was useless. Sooner or later he’d have to face Daniel. Might as well just get it over with.

A little bit of Vodka for encouragement would've gone well right then. Since there was none available, Finns resigned himself to taking a deep breath and trying to look as purposeful and relaxed as he could as he walked the rest of the way.

Daniel stood up like a thunder. Definitely angry then. Finns slowed down his pace, fearing for a second that his physical integrity wouldn’t be entirely guaranteed by the end of that confrontation.

“Hi,” he tried.

Daniel didn’t even blink.

Finns bit his lip. He should’ve thought about this before he left the Dane’s house. Hell, he should’ve thought about it before he even said anything.

New school year resolution: start thinking before doing things.

Dan moved forward, green eyes never leaving his face, burning holes across his skin. Instinctively, Finns took another step backwards, and felt ridiculous for being afraid of getting hit by his best friend. Not that he didn’t deserve it. He probably did. But he wouldn’t put it past Daniel to resort to violence. The younger boy went down the two stairsteps separating them, which didn’t make the Dane less intimidating; Daniel was still considerably taller than him.

“What?” Stephen swallowed around the lump in his throat.

”What?” Dan repeated, irony bleeding through. “Well, let’s see. You started talking nonsense, dumped me, left my house while I was in the shower, disappeared for the whole fucking afternoon, didn’t pick up the phone or replied to any of my texts and left me sitting in front of your goddamn doorstep for two hours. I don’t know, Finns. I don’t know _what_. Why don’t you help me out here, because I don’t have a fucking clue what the hell just happened!” By the time he finished, he was practically shouting, which added considerably to Stephen’s building uneasiness.

“Dan, my parents are home, could you not –“

“The Queen could be in your house right now, for all I care!”

“All right, I get it! You’re angry!”

“Angry?” His voice sounded a trifle too menacing. “Oh, Stephen. You haven’t got a fucking clue.”

The Irishman sighed. Daniel wouldn’t make this easy for him. But then again, why should he? Finns certainly hadn’t broken the news to him in a lighthearted manner. He gestured towards the back of the house and waited until his friend silently, if not amiably, agreed to continue their conversation elsewhere. Once they reached the back garden, Daniel sat down on his mother’s white bench and stared back at him, waiting.

For lack of courage to face him just yet, Stephen studied Dan’s boots. Old, battered, laces untied, probably with him since he was 13 and it was still too large to fit properly. It was all about the rebel cause. The treads were starting to wear down; he’d probably be in need of a new pair soon. That would make a good birthday present, he should keep it in mind.

“Dan,” he started, and stopped. Looked up, searched for any sign of comprehension on his friend’s face, found none, and looked away again. “I’m going to move away at the end of the year. It doesn’t make sense for us to prolong something tha-“

“Bullshit,” Dan cut him off flatly. “What doesn’t make any sense is that bunch of crap you’re on about, Stephen. I want to know what is really going on here.”

Finns let out a weary exhale. “Let’s just face it, Dan. We’ve been fooling around for a very, very long time now. But this is all it is.”

“What, are you saying you want us to be like – you want – a _relationship_?” The word came out of Dan’s mouth almost as a curse.

“Of course not!” he was quick to deny. “I wouldn’t want us to do anything differently. But the thing is we’ll have to. The longer we take to break this up, the harder it will be. I’ll be miles away, and then what?”

“You know what? You’re absolutely right, we should hire someone to invent a device that allows people to communicate across long distances. More than one, just to be sure,” Daniel said, with grim simmering sarcasm.

“I’m being serious, Daniel.”

“So am I!” He shot up from his seat, hands flying fiercely in the air. “Jesus, Stephen, you talk like we’ll never see each other ever again!”

“But it will be different! We’ll talk, I’ll visit every now and then, but there’ll be weeks, months, maybe years stretching out between us getting together again. Don’t you think things will change?”

“Nothing has to change, Finns!”

“That’s not in your hands anymore, Dan, and it’s fucking hard enough that I won’t have my best friend with me, everything else just makes it all the more complicated. We need – _I_ need this year to get used to the idea of not having you around anymore, ok? So, please, just let me.”

At that point, something snapped, twisted in its own axes and shifted sides. The animosity in the air completely dissipated, leaving a taste of something more bittersweet instead. Daniel must’ve seen something or sensed something because suddenly he wasn’t all about yelling and fighting and beating Finns back into sense. He just… stopped. The fire in his eyes deemed considerably, morphing into some kind of painful comprehension, and Stephen just hoped he hadn’t looked too pathetic.

Weary resignation hung on the Dane’s face, and eventually he said, “Ok.”

“Thank you,” Finns replied, because he didn’t know what else to say.

“If that’s really what you want. We’ll stop.”

“All right.”

“It’s just… I like us, Finns. We’re simple, you know? We get all the benefits without having to put up with all the crap of… of being together.”

“That’s because we’re not, Dan.” He smiled, aiming for mild and cool but not actually sure he’d quite achieved it.

“I know.” Dan’s eyes moved away from him for a second, scanning the windows on the house thoughtfully, and then back. “Do you want to be tough?”

This was a tricky question right there. Daniel was all about being free from commitments, but if Finns asked him right there to be his loyal loving boyfriend, there was a 99% chance he’d say yes, even if it’d kill him and their friendship all at once.

“I already said I don’t.”

“You know I haven’t been with anyone else.”

“I know.”

“That’s ‘cause I like being with you.”

Finns grinned at him. “I know.”

Daniel narrowed his eyes suspiciously at him. “Are you interested in someone else?”

“Yes, I am,” Finns rolled his eyes. “I’m breaking up with you because I want to exclusively shag Harry Kewell.”

“Oh, thank God. I thought you were going to say Stevie.”

Finns gave him a pointed look and moved around him to sit down on one of the chairs. Dan turned and then stopped in front of him, forcing Finns to lift his chin in order to look him in the eye.

“Are you sure that’s what you want?”

“No,” he said, sincerely. “But it’s what I’ll do anyway.”

Daniel nodded. “All right. If you’re certain. But.”

Finns raised one eyebrow. “But?”

“I have conditions.”

The Irishman sighed once more. “Shoot.”

“First, we’re not gonna stop hanging out.”

“Of course no-“

“Shh, I’m not done yet.”

“Sorry.”

“First, no quit hanging out. We’ll act exactly as we always did, you’re not going to get weird on me and if you do, I’ll beat the crap out of you.”

Finns solemnly raised one hand in the air. “No getting weird, I swear.”

“Second, I’m not closing the door on us. I’ll respect your wishes and keep it in my pants, but if you change your mind….” He trailed off and let it hang in the air.

“Ok. Third?”

“Third.” This time he made a pause before continuing. “We won’t change anything until summer is over. We’ll be exactly as we are right now and fuck as much as we want if we want to for as long as we’re on vacations. Then once school starts, it’s up to you.”

Finns considered his proposition for a second. One last summer. Like a goodbye. “Ok,” he said. “Sounds fair.”

He could already picture the rest of his summer would be pretty much spent indoors (eventually outdoors as well, if they felt adventurous) and consist in having sex with Daniel until he couldn’t remember his own name anymore. Not that he was necessarily against the idea.

“And I have to say I don’t even know what the fuck is going on in your head right now and I still think you’re being stupid and overreacting. But I’ll accept it if it’s what makes you happy.” _Happy_ , Finns thought. _If only you knew_ … “But there’s one thing I need to clarify here with you.”

“Ok.”

Daniel leant forward, bending down a little and, cupping his face with both hands, their noses almost touching as he looked right into his eyes, put on his most solemn voice. “I don’t care what happens this year or the next, we’ll still be friends. I won’t let anything come between us, not even your crazy mother, with all due respect.”

Finns chuckled, but acquiesced with a gentle nod of his head. Daniel placed a quick kiss on his forehead, another one on the tip of his nose, and allowed it to linger for a while longer when he pressed his lips against Finns’.

When they pulled apart, Finns murmured, “Don’t worry. You’ll find someone else to shag in no time.”

“I don’t need anyone else, Stephen. I didn't ask for one last summer just because I want to have sex with you. I told you, I like us, just the way we are. I don't want anything to change. But if you tell me to go find someone else, I will.” He let go of Finns and stood up straight again, taking a deep breath and looking around, probably just to make sure they hadn’t been seen by anyone. Only then did it occur to Finns that they were out in the garden in broad daylight while both his parents were inside doing whatever in God’s name they were doing. They’d been daring before, but this had been just plain dangerous.

And also completely worth it.

“So,” Dan continued conversationally, taking a seat back on the bench and propping his feet up on the table. “May I ask where in hell did you go after you left my house?”

“Hiding,” he stated, not even bothering telling Daniel to get his feet down. His mother would throw a fit if she saw it, but then again, after what they had just done there, anything was game.

“Where?”

“Ice cream shop.”

Dan furrowed his brow. “What kind of idiot hides at an ice cream shop?”

“You didn’t go looking for me there, did you?” he pointed out.

“I didn’t go looking for you anywhere other than your own house, but I thought you’d be brooding somewhere manly, like a pub or Albert Dock.”

“I’m anything but obvious, Dan. And besides, it turned out to be great. I ran into Stevie there.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” the Dane said, rolling his eyes. “Please, tell me this whole thing didn’t come from him.”

“Of course not. We just talked – well, I did most of the talking, anyway."

"Was there kissing again?" Dan asked, not really concealing the bitterness.

Finns still didn't like talking about That Night At The Park. It was a dark chapter in his high school life and something he wasn't very proud of. Plus, Daniel never really got completely over his quarrel with Stevie. They were civil, but it usually didn't need more than a little spark to start a fire all over again. Dan wasn't really one to be jealous, although he did like to feel prioritized, just because. But bring Stevie in the middle of things and his mood would suddenly change to unbearable mode. So his five minutes stand with Steven Gerrard was forbidden subject for the two of them. Most of the time, anyway. They'd eventually use it to hurt one another when they felt particularly mean after a petty argument or whatever. Finns always felt sorry afterwards, though.

So Stephen merely gave him the finger and moved on like he hadn't brought it up. "He just listened," Finns continued. "But that’s not the good part. He told me Rafa is bringing a new striker next season.”

“I’m really curious as to how you went from breaking up with Daniel to football there.”

Finns shrugged. “He was just trying to light up my mood.”

"Oh, was he? Isn't Stevie a gem?"

"Dan," Finns admonished.

Daniel sighed. “Is said striker supposed to be hot?”

“Don’t know, but he’s Spanish –“

“Don’t we have enough Spaniards already?”

“I’m pretty sure you told me once you had a soft spot for Spaniards.”

“Pushing him my way already, Stephen?”

Finns gave him a marked eye roll, and chose to ignore his teasing. “Anyway. He was personally sought after by Rafa and his scouting team and, according to Stevie and his sources-“

“You mean Pepe?”

“Probably. According to him, he’s like, brilliant. Stevie said, and I quote, going to turn our worlds upside down.” He finished with a grin, trying to convey as much excitement as he could, given his current state of mind wasn’t exactly making him a ray of sunshine. “Anyway, just thought you’d like to know. You’re always ranting about how we need a new striker. There you go.”

“We don’t even know if that guy’s any good. Can’t remember Pepe being a reliable source of anything.”

“But if Rafa wants him here so bad, he has to be good.”

“They’re all Spaniards, Finns. Their minds operate differently.”

“I think this striker may be just what we need. If he really is everything Stevie thinks he is, he might just change our lives.”

“Wow!” Daniel cut him off, faking a yawn. “The guy’s not even here yet and he’s already boring the hell out of me.”

“Are you seriously not interested?”

“I think there’s just a tiny little chance that I have more relevant matters to be concerned with right now other than people I couldn’t care less about.”

“Right.” Finns lowered his head, looking at his own hands. “Sorry.”

Daniel sighed, long and weary, and patted the empty spot beside him on the bench. “Come here.”

“Don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“Why not?”

Finns pointed towards his house. “Windows.”

“I’m not going to do anything funny, Finns. Just sit here.”

Still uncertain, he accepted, making sure to leave a little space between their bodies. Stephen liked to think he was a very collected guy, but he often found himself short of reason around Daniel. Pheromones, or whatever.

“Alright, Stephen,” Dan said. “You want to discuss your striker? I’ll indulge you, just so you know how good a friend I am,” he grinned. “Tell me. How is this shiny jewel of a footballer going to shake up our lives and change the world as we know it?”

Daniel searched for his hand with his own, intertwining their fingers together and squeezing it just a tad. It was the first time they ever held hands, probably the last one as well. Friends with benefits don’t hold hands, Finns thought. But friends in need of support did, best friends. It was good to know that, even though he was giving up on Daniel, his lover, which was hard enough, he wouldn’t be losing Daniel, his friend.

Finns was aiming for a hard manner of keeping himself away from the object of his desire to make sure it would remain close. Or just to help easing the pain away once he had been shipped off to the US. There was no guarantee it would work, no way of making sure he’d be able to keep it cool once Daniel showed up with a new fuck buddy. But it was all he had to work with for now.

“Well,” Stephen started. “I just feel it. He’s going to be the all and all for us. Just exactly everything we’ve been missing, the one part that has kept us from glory all these years. You’ll love him, Dan, I know it.”

“Oh, Stephen,” Dan said, laughing. “Careful there or I might start getting jealous.”

And so they talked, laughed, made plans for the summer, same as they always did. It made nothing better, Stephen reckoned. But at least it blurred it all out for a while.

 

_Fin._

**Author's Note:**

> This was my very first fanfiction in the football fandom, written several years ago. When I first started reading football fics, that one that really made me fall for the fandom was Collision Course. It has tons of chapters and it’s so complex and intricate and has so many characters! It’s incredible, really. If you haven’t read it, do it! Anyway. Out of all the things that I loved from CC, the one I adored the most by far was Finns. <3 But I felt he was very misunderstood! Almost everyone reading the story hated his ass and he did come off as an asshole and all, but, for whatever reason, I started reading between the lines and sort created this whole thing about Finns in my head as to why he behaved the way he did. I guess I just understood where he was coming from.
> 
> So one day I decided to write a backstory to him, explaining his relationship with Daniel and why the two of them were so close – and also why he felt do possessive and acted so irrationally when Daniel fell for Fernando. It was never meant to be published, just something for myself. But I decided to send it to the author and she really liked it, encouraged me to publish it and even mentioned a few things in CC (the future chapters), thus sort of making it a little bit cannon. I was really flattered that she appreciated it. <3 And it gave me courage to write more. So there, this is how I started my life in the football fandom! Thanks to Collision Course, torres and this story! <3
> 
> I totally forgot this existed until a few days ago. I went searching for it on LJ and found it in a locked post. So I thought, why not? And there you have it.


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